We have a heck of a weekend in store for you with on site coverage at 8 meets on Friday and Saturday! We will be bringing you on-site coverage from the Ferguson Falcon Invitational, Ft. Myers Optimist, UF Mountain Dew, Winter Haven Elite Invitational, Embry-Riddle Classic, Astronaut Invitational, Mt. Dora Invitational, and the Katie Caples Invitational. Of course we'll also have meet results from the other meets around the state... it's hard to be everywhere but we try!
Friday meet coverage has already began.
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FRIDAY
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Ferguson Falcon Invitational
Andrew Charles was on site for flrunners.com shooting over a thousand photos from the morning middle school session and afternoon high school races. Great job, Dru!
Official results are up. Pine Crest boys and girls sweep the meet, upsetting the host school. Ferguson girls and Sunset boys were team runners-up. Individually, Chris Baker (Pine Crest) 17:35 and Maria Valdivia (Braddock) 21:23 were your champions on a hot day on a slow course with high grass throughout.
1st Southwest Invitational
Wellington hosted the 1st Southewest Invitational at Okeeheelee Park on Friday. Defending national champion Ashley Brasovan opened the season with a less than impressive (relatively) 20:00.32, but she was a minute and twenty seconds against her closest competitor and surely was not doing anything but going through the motions. Still, I believe that is the slowest race time she has put up since... ever. The slowest time she had ever run in a race was her freshman year... an 18:18, wow that is funny how impressive her career has been! Spanish River beat out Brasovan's Wellington, 43-96.
On the boys side, sophomore Ryan Pickerling took his season out to a great start with a time of 16:36.23, leading his John I. Leonard boys to victory over Park Vista 42-50.
Katie Caples Invitational
Official results are now up. Bishop Kenny, Bartram Trail, Our Lady of Lourdes, Holy Trinity, and Bolles all looked great.
Tallahassee Teams Travel to Katie Caples - By Chris Sumner
Only showing up with five boys Maclay could not afford anyone dropping out or not finishing up to par. Patrick Swain patiently waited for the insane fast pace of the front to start to wear down and then quickly ate up the struggling runners for an impressive 7th place finish against an elite field of athletes. The Marauders finish at 6th place with their five guys. Godby sophmore Dieumy Duclos led the Cougars to a good finish with season best of 17:57. But the performance of the day for the Cougars came from the Team Captain and the team’s only senior Brandon Alexander. Brandon burst out with a new PR of 18:27 letting the team know he is serious about leading his team to the state meet in November. New comer Kendall Matthews tried to hang with his teammate Dieumy to help the team out. But after leading Dieumy for nearly 2.5 miles Kendall faded badly but managed to finish in 19:35. The Lady Cougars also came out ready to run. Working together as a solid pack the Lady Cougars finished 18th led by Christine Poole in 23:36.
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SATURDAY
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Winter Haven Elite Running Invitational
In the girls race, Sydney Devore lead basically from the gun. She came through the mile around 5:45, carrying a large chase pack with her. By two miles the chase pack had thinned out to Shelby Hayes, Mallory White, and Maggie Emmons. It would stay that way until the finish.
Devore finished with a time of 18:12 and the others were all under 18:30. Of course, after the race these times raised suspicions until it was finally announced that because of a mismarking on the back side of the course, it was going to be officially downgraded to a three mile race. Still fantastic times!
Winter Park girls were on fire... 35 points to 105 from Lakeland Christian and 110 from Dr. Phillips.
The boys race was much more clumped up throughout, with no real thinning happening until the last mile. Peter Foss of George Jenkins was the individual champion with a time of 15:46. Countryside's Zack Christienson was next in 15:51, followed by Alex Mund (DP) 15:59, and Nick Posada (WP) 16:02.
Dr. Phillips and Countryside surprised a lot of people. It was DP in first with 50 points over Countryside in 70. Of course we did get a hint at Dr. Phillips' promise this year at Lake Mary's preseason meet... this confirms it! They are for real! Countryside is also coming out of no where... their way of proving my faith was not misplaced when I agreed to put them on the ROC at flrunners on their word of the coach. They are ready. Winter Park was just behind Countryside with 74 points.
Lincoln Invitational
Summary By Coach Chris Sumner, Godby
The mighty Leon Lions let out their roar today as they showed the state they are ready to defend their title from last year. Nearly sweeping the season opener with 18 points, the Lions were led by the Dynamic Duo of Will Stanford and defending 3A state champ Matt Mizereck. The duo eased through the first mile with Whitney Strickland of NFC hanging on at what looked like a comfortable 5 flat. But after that they quickly separated and started to push each other towards an even faster pace. On his birthday, Will Stanford finished with an amazing time of 15:28 with his teammate Matt not far behind at 15:42. To put this into perspective the course record was held by Joe Franklin at a time of 15:59. For times that fast this early it is slightly scary, but exciting. The rest of the Leon Pride filed in with all respectable times only separated by Whitney in 3rd.
On the girls side the battle was a lot closer. The Maclay girls looked strong putting 3 in the top 4, but Leon responded with 5 in the top 10 to finish the sweep of the team titles. Jana Stolting of Maclay led the entire race and won her second meet of the season comfortably at 19:22.
There were a total of 79 finishers and 9 teams that scored on the girl’s side. The boy’s side had 133 finishers and 11 scoring teams. For those not from Tallahassee this course is kind of challenging. With two decent hill climbs and some winding trails it’s not what you would think of as a fast course. But after a few years of taking my team to flat courses and watching other teams on flat courses, I’m starting to wonder if the hills and uneven surfaces actually help the athletes to faster times.
Embry-Riddle Classic
Ralph Epifanio was there to cover this exciting race on a very difficult course. Read his meet summary of this race, which includes a lot of up-and-comers. Recently wed Sammy Vazquez continued his return in the college ranks after a fall from grace. And introducing Florida's new edition to the wonderful class of elite female runners! Stephanie Strasser has joined Fernandina Beach, moving in from Illinois where she regularly found herself running in the 17 minute range.
Astronaut Invitational
Mandy Perkins may not have been exactly challenged per se at the Astronaut Invitational this year, but she knew she couldn't let up! Freshman Mollie Jones of Geneva Park kept her hearing footsteps all day long, pushing the Spruce Creek senior under 19 minutes. Mandy ran 18:56, with Mollie at 19:16.
Timber Creek girls used their depth to beat out Spruce Creek, who were lead by their great top two: Perkins and Brooke Nebel (20:08). The score was 68-91.
The MOST surprising thing that happened though at Chain of Lakes yesterday was that Warwick Valley, NY was defeated! The Purple Wave have been coming down to Florida for years and are used to walking all over our state's finest... even scoring a perfect 15 at Edgewater a few years ago I believe. Before the race on Friday, the feeling (both of Warwick and others) was that it was going to happen again.
But Columbus would have none of it and defeated the Yankee invaders handily 59-82. Columbus was lead by junior Armando Del Valle, who was the lone man under 16 minutes in 15:55. Warwick crossed their top two in second and third (Dan Dewan 16:09 and Tim Luthin 16:12). But it was the 16:36 team average of Columbus that got it done.
A lot of individuals had really great break-through days on this not-as-fast-as-you-would-think course and a hot day (although some rain cooled it off momentarily). Jason McLeod of Circle Christian broke his previous PR (which he just set two weeks ago at Lake Mary) by 40 seconds with a time of 16:14 for fourth. Joseph Elsakr, Nick Argoon, Josh Peters, and many others really stepped it up!
It deserves to be said that both Lyman and Timber Creek, though outshined by Columbus and Warwick, were looking on point to start the season. Looking forward to seeing them again on this course in two weeks!
Ft. Myers Optimist
Community School girls, Immokalee boys win. Still looking for complete meet results...
Community School of Naples Girls Continue to Shine
The Fluehr sisters, identical twins, of Community School of Naples lead the way to victory going 1-2. Erika finished first in 18:45, and Kathryn was next in 19:39. CSN occupied 5 of the top 9 spots.
The Case of the Missing Meet -- flrunners.com Photographer Andrew Charles Misses his Mark
After a long drive across the state to do some on-site coverage, our rookie photographer Andrew Charles (coming off a great day of coverage the night before) showed up at Buckingham Park to find no cross country meet. Did they have this meet? Can Andrew just not follow a GPS? Are there two Buckingham Parks? We'll find out the truth!
Unfortunately that means no on-site coverage here... but hope to see results soon.
*Update* And the verdict is, they apparently changed the course location this year. According to the Ft. Myers Newspress the meet was held at Vetran's Park in Lehigh Acres. Sorry, Andrew!
UF Mountain Dew Invitational
Brittany Koziara and Connor Revord win.
Is Belen Really That Good? Yeah!
Before the season, we always do season wrap-ups and review last year's results and try to peg who's going to do what this year. Belen Jesuit was hands down the number one returning team coming back this year--it wasn't even close on paper. But with exceptionally fast regional meet they ran, maybe the inflated times made them look better than they really are.
Think again! The Wolverines dominated this one going 16:02-16:30-16:49-16:50-17:07 for just 37 points. Let's forget about the times for a minute and just look at their potent competition. Tampa Jesuit was second 35 points back and Plant was almost 60 points back. Yeah, they're for real And the scary thing is that Belen is one of the teams that you know every single year they are peaking. Years they start mediocre you know they'll be in contention for the title by the end... years they start strong, be afraid!
Chiles Girls Dominate, Powered by Freshman Fuel - by Chris Sumner
When recently interviewed about the current season, I was asked who the leaders were and what teams or individuals would be interesting to follow. I felt that obviously the Leon Lions were strong and would be led by a phenomenal duo (of Will Stanford and Matt Mizereck), but there was another big story rising up in Tallahassee. I’ve been really active helping out with the local middle school competitions in Tallahassee the past few years and I noticed there was a group of young ladies that had a bunch of talent. Well now these young ladies are starting to enter high school and all but one or two are heading to the same school. For those who were shocked by the Lady Timberwolves of Chiles today at UF, just wait, it gets better. If this team stays healthy for the next few years and everything keeps falling into place, watch out.
Freshman Carly Thomas led the young Lady Timberwolves with an impressive break-out performance. Her time of 18:49 was a huge PR from 20:28 last year. Freshman Lily Williams came in 4th right behind Carly with another impressive finish of 19:22 to start off her season for the Timberwolves. With the guidance of Coach Gowan and hopefully the quick return of Jodie McGuff this team will have a solid pack to make a strong run at state.
Mt. Dora Invitational
Melbourne dominated as expected... scoring a perfect 15 points in at least one of the genders. Atkinson dominated with a time reportedly in the low 16s which is highly impressive at this perhaps the most difficult course in the state. Photos and results to come.
Don Bishop Invitational
Hoping for results this year... we never get them! *hint hint*
East Bay girls win with 96 points, lead by Lauren Verbosky 20:49. Hillary White of King (I can't say Hillary White without thinking about the great runner from the 90s, now we have another) says she is taking the sport seriouslly this year and proved that by winning the race easily in 20:05.
Chamberlain boys beat out Hillsborough 41-83. Chamberlain's 1-2 punch crossed in that order: Mark Parrish 16:23, Chase Nelson 16:40.
Gulf Coast Stampede
In the largest race field of any meet in the state this weekend, it was mainly out of state teams that dominated the top positions. Our Florida bright spots were numerous though.
Sophomore Chrystal Wachob ran a big new PR, 20 seconds faster than her state time last year, finishing in fourth place in 19:39. That was faster than Crestview star Lauren Day who finished in 20:11. Niceville was the top Florida girls team. They finished in fifth.
The Pensacola Washingon boys took the bronze medal, the leading Florida team. They were lead by Peter Fricke (16:35, 10th place). Donald Davis of Pine Forest was the top Florida boy with a time of 16:28 for fifth place.
Key West Meet #1
The Conch Republic prepares for battle.
Lake Brantley Open
Alyssa Burkert won the girls race easily in 18:40. Olympia beat out Lake Mary for the girls team title 41-87. Olympia's boys made it much closer, but completed the sweep by edging out Colonial 52-54.
Palmer Trinity invitational
Small meet in Miami.
Venice Invitational
Still waiting on complete results. (Thanks to Rae Ann for hand typing the complete girls varsity) Naples girls win. Hannah Howell of St. Stephens' is the individual winner in 19:24.
Sarasota was the boys champions, winning 64-93 over Naples.
Vero Beach Invitational
Small meet that should have some solid competition.
Zak Lucas Invitational
Great meet in memory of a former Hernando High runner, will attract teams from Hernando, Citrus, Pasco, and Marion Counties.
Felix Soto of Lake O' Lakes won the individual title with a great time of 16:01. The boys team battle was pretty crazy: only one point separated the top three teams! Wharton beat out the competition with 92 points, Wiregrass Ranch overtook Land O Lakes on their 6th runner with 93 points!
The Wharton girls won more convincingly over Ocala Vanguard 41-76. Vangaurd's Tori Lawson was not surprisingly the individual victor, winning in 19:43. But Wharton's new transfer Alyssa Franks gave her company, finishing just 6 seconds back in second. Wharton looked very deep and impressive... proving their Red Mule performance was not a fluke.