Cross country notebook: James Wood boys looking strong

WINCHESTER — While it was the James Wood girls’ cross country team that had the best local finish by taking third at Saturday’s Third Battle Invitational, the Colonels boys are certainly looking like a team capable of defending its Class 4 Northwestern District championship.

The James Wood boys placed ninth out of 39 scoring teams at the meet hosted by Millbrook at the Third Battle of Winchester course. It was the best performance of any of the Class 4 Northwestern District schools in attendance.

Millbrook (second at last year’s district meet) was 12th with 368 points. Sherando (fourth in the district) — which was without No. 2 runner Ty Waits because of an illness — was 18th with 455 points. Fauquier (third in the district) was 29th, Liberty was 31st and Kettle Run was 34th. Handley and Culpeper County were the only district teams that did not participate.

This year’s Class 4 Northwestern District meet will take place Oct. 29 at Central High School in Woodstock.

Much like the James Wood girls, the Colonels boys also came into Saturday having won its last two meets at the city-county quad and the Buffalo Wild Wings meet at Hampshire (W.Va.) High School.

The Colonels had two of the top three local performers on Saturday in sophomores Nathaniel Woshner (25th in 16:27.8) and Liam McDonald (40th in 16:39.2).

“They all ran real well,” James Wood coach Mike Onda said. “Having PR performances out of Nathaniel and Liam definitely helped. Being up front to get some of those point totals worked well for our team. Pretty much every other guy had at least a season-best or close to a PR. Having that pack — our one to seven [runners] were 72 seconds apart, and our one to five [was 57 seconds apart] — was great. All of them are working really hard.”

The rest of James Wood’s top five featured Chris White (74th in 17:06.3), Caleb Kemer (79th in 17:08.5) and Nathan Shade (109th in 17:24.5). Onda said Kemer and Shade have shown improvement, and he added No. 6 runner Ethan Bowman, a freshman, has done well to push the top five.

Onda said White has sometimes been James Wood’s No. 2 runner instead of McDonald, but Woshner has been the team’s No. 1 runner all season.

Woshner improved his personal record by seven seconds on Saturday. His best time last year was a 16:58 at the district meet held at the Third Battle of Winchester course.

Saturday was a strong performance for Woshner, but he was aiming to do what Sherando junior James Harris did for the first time on Saturday — break 16 minutes.

“I’m obviously not at that point yet, but I’ll get there by districts or regionals,” said Woshner, who started out quicker than he normally does so he wouldn’t get boxed in during the 266-runner race.

McDonald said he beat his previous best by 51 seconds.

“This course is set really fast, so I just wanted to get a really good time and try and stick with my [training] partner Nathaniel,” McDonald said. “Today was good for me.”

Woshner said while the Colonels are doing well, they’re capable of doing better.

“Our training is not really in the spot that I want it to be,” Woshner said. “But our team is coming along. We’ve got a solid top seven, and even in our top 10, everybody is right there. We’re all in a good pack, and we’re ready for anything.”

Millbrook

While Millbrook (sixth place girls, 12th place boys) wasn’t able to best local rival James Wood on the Pioneers’ home course on Saturday, coach Kevin Shirk is looking forward to seeing what his teams can do in the postseason.

“For boys and girls, we had some bright spots but we had also some weak spots,” Shirk said. “If we can maybe our No. 4 and 5 up on the girls’ side a little bit hopefully for the district meet, we’ll be in good shape.

“On the boys’ side, we had one or two off days. Chris Simonelli (85th in 17:13.2) is coming back from a little bit of an injury. He looked a little bit off today. I think he’s got some room for improvement in a couple days. Silas [Schroer, 66th in 16:59.8] had an off day as well.”

Shirk said if a runner doesn’t start off quickly at Third Battle, they can get caught in traffic.

“You’ve got to establish position early,” Shirk said. “If you do, you can get pulled to some pretty good finishes and some pretty fast times.

“If you don’t you can get buried behind a hundred people that you don’t want to be behind. I think that happened to a few of our kids, on the girls’ side in particular. A couple of our girls just looked like they got out really slow and got into the woods pretty far behind where I think we expected them to be. Once you get back in the woods, the trail’s narrow enough where it’s hard to move around some people. I think that held them back a little bit.”

In addition to Madison Murphy (fourth in the girls’ meet), Shirk was impressed with Chance Crosen, who had his fastest boys’ time in 16:49.7 to place 50th, as well as Carter Johnson (56th in 16:54.30). Shirk said neither had run under 17 minutes before. Shirk said Maria Mejia-Villalon (98th in 20:41.5) took a good step, because she had struggled some after a strong start to the season.

Millbrook’s home meet once again turned out to be a fundraising success. Spectators donated $7,519.41 toward care of the battlefield, which topped last year’s record donation of $7,023.53.

Sherando Though the Warriors couldn’t put their best team course because of Waits’ illness, Sherando coach Megan Roberts is feeling good about her boys’ team heading into the postseason.

Roberts said junior Jon Gates (53rd in 16:51.2) eclipsed 17 minutes for the first time, and she feels Graham Schultz (99th in 17:23.1) is rounding into form after dealing with an injury.

After the first couple of meets, Sherando was looking for someone to move closer to their strong top four runners, and Roberts feels like the rest of the team has done well to close the gap. Freshman Ben Freilich placed 143rd in 17:40 to lead that group on Saturday.

“It seemed like the pack was pretty close together, which is what we want to see,” Roberts said. “Luke Waits and Ben Freilich have had breakthrough races lately, and I knew they would have good races today.”

Like the Sherando boys, the Sherando girls (eighth place on Saturday) are two weeks removed from winning the Blue Ridge Invitational in Daleville. The Warriors also won the Blue Division of the Stonewall Jackson Invitational three weeks ago.

“The great thing about our girls is their pack, and how close they are,” said Roberts of a team whose No. 6 runner on Saturday, Ryleigh Combs, finished ahead of James Wood’s No. 5 and Millbrook’s No. 4. “Molly [Robinson] has been leading us all season, but after that, race to race, it’s been any mix of the order that they come in. Our 6 was our 2 a couple races ago, and today was a little bit of a mix up again. I think that’s a strength for us. If someone has a bad day, there’s someone to sweep in and pick up the pieces. If our 6 and 7 come in ahead of someone else’s [No.] 5, that’s going to help us at the district meet.”

Clarke CountyThe Eagles were one of the smallest schools at Third Battle, and neither team was able to finish in the top 30.

But Clarke County coach Jeff Webster thinks his team is getting to where it needs to be as it prepares to take on teams from the Class 2 group it belongs to the rest of the year. The Bull Run District meet is Oct. 30 at the New Market Battlefield.

Clarke County was led on the girls’ side by senior Kateri Thorne (133rd in 21:10) and the boys were led by freshman Ben Fulmer (180th in 18:02.8). Each set PRs.

“We gave [our runners] some pretty lofty goals, and by and large most of them rose to the challenge,” Webster said. “We had a couple of kids who just didn’t feel well and didn’t race well, but most kids set all-time personal bests, which is really all you can ask for. The younger runners had dramatic improvements because they’re starting to gain that race experience as well as getting in shape. It was a perfect day for running and a perfect course to get that done.”

HandleyThe Judges sent most of their runners to the MileStat.com Invitational at Pole Green Park in Mechanicsville, but senior Kendall Felix competed in the open race in the morning for people of all ages because of her involvement in the “Mamma Mia!” musical at Handley this weekend. Felix recorded a time of 20:10.1.

In a phone interview on Sunday, Handley coach Mark Stickley said Felix has done a great job leading the team with her busy schedule going back to the summer. The Judges have been without their No. 1 runner, Tori Stanford, since early September because of a stress fracture in her foot.

“She was a little behind in the summer because of her work schedule and all, but she’s gotten in really good shape,” Stickley said. “And those kids put so much time and energy into the play. For instance, we didn’t have school on Monday and Tuesday last week, and one day she asked to leave a little early because she had to prepare for 10-3 and 5-10 that day for the play. She was phenomenal in the play.”

Stickley laughed as he added that Felix’s life will be a lot simpler now that she can just focus on schoolwork and cross country heading into districts. He’s not sure how his team will do at districts, but he likes the fact that his team is running together. Only 27 seconds separated Handley’s No. 2 through 6 runners on Saturday.

“I love the way they’re racing,” Stickley said. “I said at the beginning of the year, we have a lot of very talented kids, we just don’t have a lot of race experience. They’re getting it now and they’re looking better. I’d like to see them move a little farther up, but I’m really happy with where they’re at right now.”

Stickley said the Handley boys’ success will be contingent on closing the gap from between their top three runners and the rest of the team. Grayson Westfall (16:26 Saturday) and Bennett Cupps (16:35) are two of the area’s best runners, but there was a 1:15 gap between Stickley’s son Ryan (17:00) and the rest of the team.

“Overall, our top three have running extremely well,” Stickley said. “Four and five have been running well, too, but right now there’s too big of a gap. But pretty much everyone across the board got personal bests [Saturday].”

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