So Close!

The boys team had quite the battle with Penfield last night, and needed to win 2 of the 3 relays to win the meet. Since Penfield went to the State XC Championships last fall, there was no way we could win the 4x800, so we had to win the first two. The 4x100 came through, but the 4x400 got edged out. So, our rag-tag 4x800 relay took the line:
- Nico, our young, up-and-coming runner, went 2:12 to give us an early lead.
- Karl, the volleyball player, new to the 800, ran 2:19 to keep us in contention
- AJ, the freshman who still has to learn about even pace, showed incredible speed in the final straight, running 2:15 and handing off in the lead. Could it be? A bunch of "nobodies" challenging the top distance team in Section V?
- Ryan, the hurdler, anchored for the team, fresh off a leg on the 4x400 relay. He matched the Penfield anchor for 500m, before fatigue from the day caught up with him.

Still, an awesome effort by a team that had absolutely no chance to win the relay!

In the 1600, Nico made a bold move to go after 2nd place, but ended up settling for 4th. Everyone else was out way to fast, but hung on for decent times:
Nico 70 74 71 80 4:55
AJ 74 84 87 73 5:18
Chris 71 85 87 79 5:22
Joe 77 90 90 95 5:52
John 79 92 94 88 5:53

In the 1500, Megan let the Penfield girl lead much of the way, but waited too long to make her move and was outkicked:
Megan 92 87 86 60 5:25
Alaina 97 92 93 65 5:47
Clare 96 92 96 67 5:51

Nico jumped into the 400 Hurdles (and grabbed third), so in the boys 800, it was all Penfield:
AJ 69 2:23
John 78 2:40
Joe 76 2:42

The girls race looked like it would be exciting, the early pace was somewhat slow, with Megan and Chelsea content to follow the Penfield girl. When the Penfield girl made her move just after the 400, Megan couldn't cover and Chelsea didn't go around her, and they couldn't close the gap back up. Katie showed some serious speed the last 100m or so - when she learns to run this race, she should immediately drop 15 seconds or so:
Megan 76 2:35
Chelsea 77 2:36
Clare ? 2:54
Katie ? 3:03
Alana ? 3:04

The 3200 was uninspiring, as our boys could not maintain contact with Penfield's third runner, who was well over 11 minutes.
Chris 78 86 88 92 85 85 85 80 11:19
Kenny 80 86 86 88 87 88 88 80 11:23
Nate 79 86 86 89 88 91 95 88 11:42

I didn't get to see much of the 3000, since they were run simultaneously, but Alaina pulled well ahead of Brianna in the middle of the race, but not by enough to break 13 - she was 13:07, Brianna 13:35, and I missed the other times.

The girls 4x400 featured some distance runners, as they won easily:
Megan 67.64
? 68.31
Kayleigh 69.63
Chelsea 66.87

Three of the girls came back for the 4x800, but the results weren't as good as Molly took it out much too hard and faded at the end of the second leg:
Megan 84 2:44
Molly 77 2:57
Kayleigh 80 2:55
Chelsea 83 2:48

And here are the splits from the boys relay:
Nico 63 2:12
Karl 66 2:19
AJ 65 2:15
Ryan 67 2:28

JP 75 2:39
Joe ~72 2:47
Kenny 75 ~2:36
Chris ? ~2:49

Good luck tomorrow at the Boys & Girls Invitational!