Above: The Vikings did well at the 15-team Eveleth Invitational. Josh Ensign and David Bergstrom ran together for much of the varsity race at home at Pincushion (above) and at Eveleth. At the Eveleth Invite, David finished in 12th and Josh in 14th.
After a week off and lots of tough hill training, the Viking cross-country team headed to the Eveleth Invitational, a big, 15-team meet including most of the Section 7A teams, with the exception of powerhouse Esko. Both the boys’ and girls’ teams have been showing a lot of progress—the girls working to replace the loss of six of nine members of last year’s state meet team—and the boys patiently building a strong varsity team from our youthful group.
After a good warm-up on a beautiful day for running, the girls headed into their lane while coaches April Wahlstrom, Beth Schield and I jogged about a quarter mile out onto the course, where the girls would run two hilly loops before heading back to the finish. With the odd downhill start into a gully, we coached the girls to let loose at the start and get good position before easing into a sustainable pace.
Led by senior Ailee Larson, they did just that. It wasn’t long before they were swallowed up by the pack, as the normal high school technique of starting hard and hanging on started to play out. Ailee tucked in behind the lead group including last year’s winner and runner up at Section, teammate Anna Schield about 20th in the next pack, Shelby Ahrendt keeping Anna in sight and Cheyenne Sorlie setting the pace for the rest of our developing varsity. By the second loop, Ailee couldn’t resist the lead and against her coach’s suggestion, towed along the other top two girls. Meanwhile, Anna was pushing up through the pack. As they came up the final big climb before the finish, Ailee had opened up an unbeatable lead, not even needing her blazing finish to win, going away in 16:38, a 100-yard win. Anna had climbed up to fifth before being nipped in an exciting sprint finish, finishing sixth in 17:17. Shelby hung on for 22nd in 18:59. Next came Audrey Summers, 40th in 20:05, Sara Schield two places back in 20:12, and Cheyenne 46th in 20:24, an unbelievable 11-minute improvement from last year. Kara Ramey was the next Viking in 21:06, Sarissa Falk in 21:52, Katrina Axtell 22:05, Mara MacDonell, 22:15, Amber Todd, 22:40 and Bailey Morrison, 24:21.
The Viking girls’ team finished third at the Invite. Upper right: Sarissa Falk kept a steady pace, finishing with a time of 22:05. Right: Shelby Ahrendt helped set the pace for the developing varsity girls’ team, finishing in 18:59.
In the team standings, the girls finished third, behind Pequot Lakes (not in our section) and International Falls. In the hunt!
It wasn’t too long before the varsity boys lined up. Kieran Scannell didn’t need Ailee’s win to get fired up, but it helped him with his preparation. After a big win in the Viking Challenge two weeks ago, we were anticipating another win, in pretty much the same fashion. Let the ultra-aggressive Eveleth boys set a blistering starting pace, then put the hammer down when it felt good.
Coming over to the loops, that was exactly what was going on. Kieran was practically sprinting back in about 30th. By the time they had completed half of the first loop, he had moved up to seventh, tracking down the leaders. Back in the main chase pack, David Bergstrom was setting the pace for Josh Ensign, while Ben Seaton was starting stronger than normal, just ahead of Darren Waha and Daniel Ahrendt, with the rest of the boys spread throughout the pack. Early into the second loop, Kieran was pulling clear of the field, winning by a devastating 37 seconds in 17:19. David and Josh had moved up into the medals, finishing 12th and 14th in 19:07 and 19:13 respectively. Ben put on a good sprint, moving up to 36th (out of 120) in 20:10. Darren displayed the best finishing sprint of his career, moving up to 46th in 20:39, with Dan five spots back in 20:50. Every one of the boys had improved last year’s times by at least a minute, a great testament to their summer running and hard work so far this season.
Therest of the Viking varsity also showed solid improvement, with Joey Chmelik running 21:17, Alex Ditmanson, 22:19, Drew Christensen, 22:43, Daniel Ditmanson, 24:24, Sebastian Schnobrich, 25:56 (a three-minute improvement) and Karl Ingebrigtsen 27:55, a great first competition for the senior. Overall, the boys finished fourth, only one point behind International Falls, nine behind state-rated Eveleth and 23 behind rated Mesabi East. Also in the hunt!
The final race of the day was the junior high race. Boys and girls, Class A and AA. As Coach Wahlstrom refers to it, “the puppy race.” Just like puppies they were off at the shot of the starting pistol. Then right on cue in front of us, one of the young boys ran into a course marking pole, bending it over while three more piled into him on the ground. Yup, a puppy race.
Up with the fast puppies, 135 strong, Pete Summers was leading the Vikings in about 30th, with Will Seaton only a short distance back, and our only girl in this race, Matea Acero, in the middle of the boys and near the girl leaders. She ran steady the whole race, finishing the 1.5 miles in 10:57 for seventh place. Looks like she wants to join the older girls sometime soon.
Pete just missed the ribbons, finishing 26th in 10:07. Will had the best race of his young career, running 10:42. Owen Cruikshank ran 11:17, Fletcher Kasell, 11:23, Roman Schnobrich, 11:26 and Sean MacDonell, 11:41. Next up for the Vikings is the Milaca MegaMeet, with half the top teams in the state and a total of 3,500 competitors. A real zoo.
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