Lauren Hunecke is more than just a singer in a rock-and-roll band. Much, much more.
Hunecke, a Batavia senior, is a member of a local all-girl cover band called Groovy Tuesdays. It’s safe to say she’s a real go-getter.
“I love to sing,” said Hunecke, who is accompanied by two guitarists, a bass player and a drummer. “We play a lot of classic rock — Black Sabbath, the Beatles, Led Zeppelin.”
The group met while taking lessons at the School of Rock in Geneva.
“We also try new things, trying to expand,” said Hunecke, who could have been describing her own personal mantra.
She works part time at Oberweis Dairy, took up wrestling last year, runs track and cross country and is in the process of applying for a NROTC scholarship because she wants to serve as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps.
“I want that stability in college and to serve the country,” Hunecke said. “I want to get a degree in criminal justice, criminology or possibly global studies and enter something like Homeland Security, the FBI or some branch like that.”
In the meantime, she keeps going and going.
Finally healthy after an injury-plagued high school athletic career, Hunecke has emerged this fall as a key player for a band of runners who make up Batavia’s cross country team.
“She hadn’t been able to get anything going,” Batavia coach Chad Hillman said of Hunecke entering her senior year. “But she’s been very healthy and is awesome right now.”
Hunecke has settled in as the team’s third runner behind team leaders Katrina Schlenker and Jenna Schifferer.
Last weekend, Hunecke earned all-conference honors by finishing seventh in 18 minutes, 7.8 seconds in the DuKane Conference Meet at Lake Park.
Schlenker finished first in 17:03.4 and Schifferer took fourth in 17:59.0. Batavia was the runner-up as a team with 61 points. St. Charles East won the conference championship with 45.
With that time, Hunecke has shaved a remarkable 4:08 off her personal record for the 3-mile races since the start of the season.
The team returns to action Saturday at the Class 3A Proviso West Sectional.
Hunecke’s best effort a year ago running on the JV was 22:15.
She was slowed by a pair of stress fractures in her left shin as a freshman. She had a stress reaction late in her sophomore track season and had to wear a boot, then was diagnosed last year with anemia midway through the cross country season and prescribed iron supplements.
“I kind of didn’t know when to take a break,” Hunecke said. “I didn’t know when to stop and just kept going, kept pushing.”
Her father, a lieutenant in the Wheaton Fire Department, is a marathan runner.
“I’ve always loved running,” Hunecke said. “My dad was a huge inspiration but didn’t push me into it.
“When I was really young, he would push me in a stroller when he ran, and as I got older, I would bike with him. I loved being outside on the bike path.”
Another health hurdle earlier in her life also helped broaden her horizons.
Lifting to throw something while in first grade, she broke her arm and was eventually diagnosed with an aneurysmal bone tumor. She had three surgeries.
“I was limited for sports and got into music and the arts,” Hunecke said. “Even later, I almost felt like I couldn’t do sports. It took me awhile to find my way.”
As a fifth grader, she had a small role in the high school musical and at 12, auditioned for the role of Helen Keller in “The Miracle Worker” staged by the Albright Community Theatre in town.
“I thought it would be easy because I didn’t have to memorize any lines,” Hunecke said. “She doesn’t talk. That was my thought process as a 12-year-old. Boy was I wrong.
“It was a physically aggressive play because she was an aggressive child. It was really challenging but really cool to learn from a completely different perspective.”
It appears to have served her well.
