The Council of New England Secondary Schools Principals’ Associations, the governing body for all interscholastic sports in New England, is holding a cross country competition this weekend in Manchester, Conn., as it has for several decades.

Once again, Maine will not send its top teams, electing instead to send 25 boys and girls competitors.

Locally, nine runners have qualified for the elite New England race – three girls and six boys from eight schools.

Leading the way among the locals is Tyler Jasud of Mountain Valley, who finished fifth in the Class B meet last weekend in a time of 16:37.6 on the 5-kilometer course at Troy A. Howard Middle School in Belfast.

Nick Williams of Poland, Nick Kazar of Edward Little, Adam Deveau of Mt. Blue, Dan Suthers of Lisbon and Dan Seltzer of Elan School also qualified in a tightly contested boys’ competition.

Class B sent the majority of the runners to the New England boys’ race this year with 15.

In the girls’ race, Lily Hanstein of Mt. Blue and Amanda Ivey of Oxford Hills from Class A and Jen Monsulick of Maranacook from Class B qualified. Class B held a slight edge with 12 runners qualified to Class A’s 11.

The current policy of the Maine Principals’ Association states that, for both boys and girls, the four individual class champions as well as the 21 fastest times, regardless of class, qualify for the New England meet.

The last time Maine allowed a team to compete in the championships was in 1978. Two proposals to change that in recent years have been voted down.

The MPA’s cross country committee has approved a new proposal to allow the state champion boys’ and girls’ teams in each class to compete in the New Englands, as well as the next two teams regardless of class.

The MPA holds its fall meeting in Portland on Nov. 18-19, where the issue is again expected to arise.

Under the proposed rule, the Lisbon and Elan boys’ would have qualified for the New England meet as champions in their respective classes.

As it stands, only Suthers and Seltzer have qualified as individuals from those teams. Lisbon and Scarborough, the Class A champion, were regarded as the top two boys’ teams in the state.

On the girls’ side, Mt. Ararat and John Bapst are the top two teams in the state. Both programs have both qualified three individuals for the New England race.