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Nathan Vogel, who placed 17th at Berean, runs in a cluster of runners, including teammate Jonathan King, early in the race. |
With a couple of young runners switching to the junior varsity race for this event, the Hillsboro boys? cross-country team finished a distant sixth at the Berean Invitational Thurs?day at Harvey County East Park.
A phenomenal Mulvane team, which swept the top four places and five of the top six, coasted to an easy team title with only 16 points. Berean Academy, which had the next three best runners, was second with 62 points.
No other school in the 11-team field broke 100 points; Hillsboro came in with 181.
Once again, Nathan Vogel led the HHS effort with a 17th-place finish in 17 minutes, 27 second. Following him were Bret Mueller (21st, 17:55), Jonathan King (24th, 18:00), Michael Christian (60th, 20:00) and Daniel Gray (69th, 20:44).
Mueller, a sophomore, broke 18 minutes for the first time in his high school career.
?Our varsity boys? team (score) was higher as a result of switching some guys to different races,? coach Stuart Holmes said. ?Michael and Daniel both did a good job, running (personal records) and had a great attitude about switching for one meet.?
In fact, seven of the nine Trojans who ran Thursday set PRs despite strong winds.
?Our training has gone especially well the last two weeks and the resulting improvement is showing itself in the meets,? Holmes said.
The lineup switch did pay dividends in the JV race as Josh Richert (19:05), Dimitri McClelland (19:15) and Justin King (19:35) placed fourth through sixth, respectively, in the field of 65 runners.
The top three runners in the race came from Mulvane.
In the girls? JV race, Saman?tha Ens placed second in a field of 27.
Coming?Hillsboro will compete at Sterling on Thursday. Races begin at 4:30 p.m.
