Cross country teams hold respective regional meets this week at Greenfield
Greenfield Park in Botetourt County will be a busy place this week as both the Region III and Region C cross country championships will be held on the rolling slopes of the local park.
LB's Bennett Witcher passes a Byrd runner in the Blue Ridge District cross country meet.-Photo by H.G. McCoy Jr.
The Region III meet will be held today, with the girls meet set to take the gun at 3:30 p.m. The boys follow, and the top four teams go to the state meet, as well as the top 15 individuals.
The Region C meet will be Thursday, same time, same deal. The state Group A, AA and AAA meets will be held at the Great Meadow course near Warrenton on Saturday, Nov. 14.
Last Wednesday the Blue Ridge District meet was held at Greenfield. The William Byrd boys and the Northside girls were team winners, while LB’s boys and girls both finished third and advanced to the Region C meet.
In the boys meet Micah Luedtke ran 19:15 to finish sixth overall and lead the Cavaliers. Kevin O’Connor of Byrd won the race in 17:45. Also scoring for LB were Bennett Witcher in 12th, Tyler Barnette in 18th, Michael Chesser in 20th, and Mitch Willis in 23rd.
Erin Wheeler of Northside won the girls race in 21:07. First for LB was Taylor Cline, who was fourth in 23:48. Also scoring for the girls were Eryn Turney in seventh, Sarah Hammer in 9th, Jessica Snead in 15th, and Samantha Bailey in 18th.
In the Pioneer meet the Craig County girls won their sixth Pioneer District cross country championship in the past seven seasons when the Rockets outran the competition at Glen Maury Park in Buena Vista last Wednesday. Craig scored 38 points in the meet, with Highland County finishing second with 47. Highland is the only school to beat Craig in the district meet for the past seven years, topping the Rockets by just one point in 2007. James River finished third with 60 points, Bath was fourth with 78, and Parry McCluer did not have a complete team.
Highland’s Haley Billingsly (Jr.) won the race in 23:02, 43 seconds ahead of River’s Britta Grim. Maggie Gumbine of James River was 11th and Katherine Day was 13th.
Covington won the boys championship with 40 points, followed by James River with 57, Bath County with 65, Highland County with 87, and Craig County with 96. Host Parry McCluer did not have a complete team.
Bath’s Matt Persinger, a junior, won the boys race in 19:18. Dylan Coleman of James River was fourth in 20:13 and Austen Bryant of the Knights was close behind at 20:21, finishing fifth. Andrew Fields also slipped into the top 15.
