The "Run-Down": George Fox XC Classic

 

Considering that he lived in the 17th century, I am fairly certain that George Fox never ran an XC race, but we Panthers sure love his XC Classic! The race is at Willamette Mission State Park near Salem, Oregon. It is put on by George Fox University.

 

Future Varsity raced first. Girls, then boys. Junior Sonata Jensen-Meyer was lovin' it as she was the only Panther girl in her race and she had her whole team cheering her on as she ran her first sub 30 minute 5K. The logistics for the Boys Future Varsity race was a bit more challenging as we had eight Panthers that were scheduled to step up to the starting line at 10:40 AM. Seven of them made it on time; Coach Seekins tried to stall the starter, but to no avail the gun went off with Senior Collin Manning nowhere to be seen. He did show up at 2:25 later and started his own race; we figure he just wanted to give the rest of the runners a fair handicap as he was ready to run his best race of the season. He managed to catch more than 3/4ths of them (76 of 99). The team just missed eclipsing Ridgefield for the title since Collin had 5 teammates finish ahead of him. We had new PR's set by Freshman Jeffrey Wells (3rd) and Sophomore Michael Stevens (13th) while Senior Luke Belzer ran a season's best and was edged out by a Hockinson kid by 4 strides for the individual title. Freshmen Warren Henderson (14th) and Andrew McElhaney (18th) completed the scoring five for the Panthers. Junior Ryan Perkins also established a 36 second PR to put a smile on his face as he beat 8 opponents to the finish line.

 

The girls found a few more PR's than the Future Varsity Boys, and sizable ones on that. Senior Tabby Hearn and Junior Signe Zacho posted the largest varsity PR's of the day, both just over 1 minute. Junior Hannah Swigert (3rd) along with Freshmen Brooklyn Bausch and Annabelle Palmer all had 30 second plus or minus PR's! Annabelle has been on a roll as she keeps P.R.ing and finally broke 23 minutes as she pushed to a new level of pain (fun pain, of course).

 

For the boys, the individual performance of the day came from Senior Bailey Duncan. His dramatic finish was classic "Bailey Toughness" as he held off a fellow Steens camper by two steps, finishing second (16:33.0) to the best runner in our district for the second time this week. Junior Aiden Pullen was not too far behind in 16:51 (6th) for a PR by the slimmest of margins. Freshman Gabriel Dinnel finished 8th in 17:02.2 on a photo finish, and the rest of the Panthers captured new PR's for 6 of 7 for the Varsity Boys. Sophomore Tanner Lees ran 18:17.5 and our Freshmen in the race followed suit with Troy Prince-Butterfield (17:51.2), Koy Chaston (17:58.4) and Ian Palmer (18:26 which was the biggest PR in the group, 37 seconds).

 

The team scoring for the Varsity Boys was interesting. We figured it would be a 3 way race with Ridgefield (2 in the top 10) and Bandon (3 in the top 10) as we placed 3 in the top 10. The Spudders edged us out by 4 points and Bandon was hot on our heels just 8 points back (the next team was 76 points behind us). So the Panther boys walked away with a nice 2nd place team plaque and 4 Varsity individuals adorning "Top Placer" T-shirts. It was a good day for the Panthers.

 

The Panthers face the Monarchs of Mark Morris next Wednesday at Kelso HS to wrap up the dual meet.

 

Coach Terry L. Howard

 

Here are the line scores:

 

Varsity Boys

 

1 Mile

2 Mile

3 Mile

5000 M

 

Bailey

2nd

 5:03

10:25

 15:57

16:33.0

P.R.

Aiden

6th

 5:03

10:35

 16:14

16:51.1

P.R.

Gabriel

9th

 5:07

10:43

 16:23

17:02.2

Troy

22nd

 5:22

11:18

 17:14

17:51.2

P.R.

Koy

26th

 5:26

11:17

 17:17

17:58.4

P.R.

Tanner

31st

 5:36

11:28

 17:40

18:17.5

P.R.

Ian

34th

 5:33

11:32

 17:45

18:26.0

P.R.

 

Of 106

 

 

 

 

 

Future Varsity Boys

 

 

 

 

 

Luke

2nd

 5:42

11:49

  17:42

18:22.4

Jeffrey

3rd

 5:41

11:49

  18:09

18:50.0

P.R.

Michael

13th

 6:06

12:40

  19:32

20:16.5

P.R.

Warren

14th

 6:05

12:49

  19:46

20:29.0

 

Andrew

18th

 6:04

12:54

  19:52

20:42.7

 

Collin

24th

 8:06

14:15

  20:32

21:13.1

(-2:25)

Preston

69th

 7:25

15:07

  23:13

23:56.0

 

Ryan

92nd

 8:16

17:22

  26:09

27:00.9

P.R.

 

Of 100

 

 

 

 

Varsity Girls

 

 

 

 

 

Hannah

20th

 6:07

12:54

  19:44

20:24.7

P.R.

Brooklyn

27th

 6:51

14:12

  21:46

22:30.1

P.R.

Annabelle

30th

 6:54

14:22

  21:48

22:39.6

P.R.

Lydia

41st

 7:15

15:00

  23:15

24:02.0

 

Signe

42nd

 7:39

15:39

  23:17

24:03.9

P.R.

Tabby

65th

 8:01

16:38

  25:23

26:17.6

P.R.

Abby

70th

 7:51

17:21

  27:00

27:56.9

 

 

Of 74

 

 

 

 

 

Future Varsity Girls

 

 

 

 

 

Sonata

21st

 8:22

18:31

  28:16

29:13.8

P.R.

 

Of 37