At the Eastern League Cross Country Championships held at Morley Field last Thursday, the usual suspects led the boys and girls teams in their respective races. Because the races were so fast, we entered only our top two boys, senior Raphael Roos and sophomore Nathan Ayan, in the varsity race. Both responded with personal records. Roos clocked 17:30 over the challenging 3.11 city conference course to knock 24 seconds off his previous best time.
Ayan topped that with a 42-second improvement with a time of 17:50. Both received one of the coveted championship medals (top fifteen), with Roos placing 11th and Ayan 14th.
In the girls’ varsity race, Morgan Maske improved her personal best by 41 seconds while placing seventh with a time of 20:44. What’s more impressive is that time was over two minutes faster than what she ran as a freshman. Our second finisher, just missing the podium in 16th place, was Gwynne Everitt, who ran 22:13. Rounding out the scoring were Maeson Everitt, Carly DeVore, and Nadia Roos. An ailing Jaya Jost was our pusher. As expected, the girls place third for the season behind La Jolla and Our Lady of Peace.
Maesan Everitt, Gwynne Letcher, Nadia Roos, Morgan Maske, Jaya Jost, Carly DeVore: Photo by Phil Grooms
The boys’ JV race was pretty fast because a varsity Cross Country team consists of only seven runners. Because of this limitation, many boys on the other teams had to run in the JV race. Our top runner was Jack Letcher, who placed fourth in 18:50, followed by Xavier Marsh, Jack Shumaker, Tyler Horton, Austin Litteral, Oscar Alicandri, Anton Youngblood, Chace Smith, Oliver Surdykowski, and Woody Smith. In the girls’ JV race, Stefanie Romero, Mia Sarchi, and Edie Alicandri picked up JV medals (top 25).
Next up for the team is the CIF championships on November 11th at Morley Field, where we’ll take varsity teams of seven boys and seven girls. In addition to the championship ranks, at stake are berths to the state meet on November 25th at Woodward Park in Fresno. The top three teams will advance in our division. Once the top three teams are determined, the top five runners not on one of the three advancing also advance, provided they place in the top twelve overall.
Middle Row: Coach John Downey, Oliver Surdykowsky, Nathan Ayan, Oscar Alicandri, Anton Youngblood, Woody Smith, Chace Smith, Jack Letcher
Back Row: Jack Shumaker, Rafael Roos, Carlos Pulido, Austin Litteral, Philippe Solloa, Xavier Marsh, Tyler Horton, Coach George Green: Photo by George Green (with remote trigger)
