Top: Junior high runners took off strong in the recent meet at Pincushion Mountain. Left: Matea Acero sprinted hard to catch this South Ridge runner at the Polar Conference meet. Acero finished 7th to make All Conference. Middle: Giving it her all, Maya McHugh finished her 5K race in 23:16. Right: Powering to the finish, a happy Isak Terrill placed 27th in the JV race.
The Polar League Conference Meet marks the winding down of the cross country season. Many of our runners only have one more meet, which will take place on Tuesday, October 20. Fourteen of our runners will move on to run at the 7A Section Meet on October 29 and a couple may make it to the State Meet at St. Olaf College on the 7th of November.
For many of our runners the conference meet allows them to truly gauge their level of improvement for the season as they had an opportunity to run on the same course in September.
Today the Viking varsity teams both placed 3rd. Our boys’ team finished with 53 points behind Esko (35) and Moose Lake/Willow River/Barnum (37). The boys finished ahead of South Ridge. Our girls’ team finished a close 3rd with 61 points behind South Ridge (27) and Carlton (55). The girls finished in front of Moose Lake/Willow River/ Barnum and Esko.
Within the girls’ race Matea Acero was awarded with All Conference honors as she finished in 7th place with a time of 22:02. Abi Seipke had a great race and improved her time on this course by a minute and finished in 12th place with a time of 22:27.
Maya McHugh had 50 seconds of improvement on this course and finished in 23:16. These three varsity girls along with Isable Schottenbauer, Kate Walsberg, Louise Ramberg, and Emily Seipke had the lowest total score of all seven runners scored points. There is a lot of depth in this young team.
Alyssa Martinson (24:50) and Ruby Walsberg (25:07) both earned some hardware in the junior varsity race as they finished in 3rd and 4th place. Marin Hay also had a nice showing finishing her race in 30:47.
In the boys’ varsity race we had two runners earn All Conference honors; Noah Smith (18:11) finished in 3rd place and Adam Ruzicka (18:36) finished in 4th place.
The rest of this group really had great times with huge amounts of improvement, which is impressive since they are already performing at a high level. Brenden Seipke (19:16) improved his time by a minute from September. Will Surbaugh (19:47) improved by over a minute along with Leif Anderson (20:19) and Thatcher Sunday (20:25). Sam Libby improved by 23 seconds and ran 21:29.
Several of our junior varsity boys not only improved their times for this course but they walked away from this race with new season best times which is quite an accomplishment on our tough course. Andy Kern (22:37) finished in 13th. Jake Bilben (22:47) finished in 15th and Isak Terrill (29:25) finished in 27th. All of these runners should be proud of the way that they were able to improve with such a difficult course.
We had three junior high girl runners earn medals. Robin Henrikson finished in 3rd place and ran her 2.6k run in 11:39. Hazel Oberholtzer took off 2 minutes and 40 seconds of her previous time and finished in 4th place in 11:41. Amelia Roth subtracted 2 minutes from her time and finished in 7th place with a time of 12:17.
Leif Anderson (left) improved his best time by about one minute at the conference meet. Anderson finished with a fine time of 20:19.
There were several other girls who had really big improvements, Zoe Nonnemacher (12:44) improved by 35 seconds, Abbey Stoddard (14:41) improved by an amazing three minutes and Chloe Blackburn (16:48) improved by almost two minutes. Quite an accomplishment for these girls.
We had three junior high boys earn medals. JC Holman finished in 5th place and ran his 2.6k race in 10:26, Jron Tamanaha finished in 8th place in 10:58, and Tate Crawford finished in 10th place with a time of 10:59.
We also had some individuals improve their time from the beginning of the season by over two minutes. Tanner DeBoer (12:46), Lynden Blomberg(12:52), and Doran Acero (14:02) were all pretty shocked when they saw how much they improved on this course. These are the types of improvements that can really show the benefits of training and help to create a culture of hard work and striving for one’s best. It was fun to see these runners experience pride for their efforts.
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