Alissa Lander and Cody Robinson had big performances as each dominated their division races.
Lander exploded at the one mile mark in her race. Vaughn from Menard was shoulder to shoulder with Lander at the mile mark but Lander changed gears, surging mightily through mile two extending to a 120-meter lead. That was not the end for Lander as she continued pouring the coals on and won the race easily by 46 seconds finishing with a time of 19:04 in the 5000 meter race. There were 127 runners in the race.
Cody Robinson’s race was different. Robinson took the lead at the 200 meter mark and never looked back. Several different runners contended for second but Tinnarello of West Monroe claimed that place, 14 seconds behind Robinson. Robinson showing consistency in his third straight 5,000 meter race, clocked a winning time of 16:26 on a tough course. There were 216 runners in the boys division.
Seventh grader Erika Needham got a lot of notice in running her first varsity race, finishing in ninth place in her first three mile/or 5,000 meter race. Her time of 21:43 in her first varsity race and ninth place finish was very impressive, getting the attention of state champ favorite Medard.
The three amigos of Kaylee Davis (17th place – 22:22), Kerrigan Zachary (26th – 22:56), and Angelina Futch (36th – 23:36), battled each other, pushing the team finish to its best overall finish since 1999. Finishing the varsity team scoring was seventh grader Laney Lindbergh (51st – 24:50), Laura Robinson (55th – 25:06), and seventh grader Rachel Morgan (64th – 26:20). The varsity girls team finished a strong second in the 14 team field.
In the variety boys division, strong support for Cody Robinson came from sophomores Tyler Davis (20th – 18:35) and Logan Bailey (21st – 18:37). Davis out sprinted and edged teammate Bailey in the last 150 meters. Ninth grader Timothy Mansfield continued his impressive first season performances careering 48th place at 19:47. Junior Kelvin Alexander, who has been battling injuries in the last week, dropped off in performance finishing (145th – 23:05).
The Running Warriors placed seventh out of 23 teams.
In the junior high boys division, Lakeside (made of all seventh graders) was led by a very competitive Toby Askew (seventh place – 12:19). Strong support Askew came from Seth Levesque (34th – 13:26) and Jairo Aguinaga (37th – 13:26). Finishing team scoring were much improved Kendravious Dubose (96th – 15:42) and Ean Staley (103rd – 16:17). There were 149 boys competing in this division. Lakeside junior boys finished a very respectable sixth out of 12 teams, which is very good considering their age.
Sarah Parnell, who joined the recently, was the lone competitor in the junior high girls. Parnell continued her improvement posting 62nd place at 16:48.
Coach Grantham’s thoughts on this weeks performance, “Our veterans are getting sharper as the season progresses. We had our biggest week of the year, conditioning wise, which may have left us a little dead legged. But LHS is a bunch of scrappy battlers that fight to the end of each contest. I am most impressed by their support for each other.”