Konyar, Wood girls repeat as district XC champions

WINCHESTER — A broken-down running watch might not help other people move as fast as Kate Konyar, but it might not be a bad investment for them based on how successful she is competing with one.

The James Wood junior demolished the 111-runner field by one minute, 15.5 seconds over 3.1 miles on Tuesday to repeat as Northwestern District girls’ cross country champion at the Third Battle of Winchester Battlefield course. Konyar crossed the line in 18 minutes, 2.3 seconds.

Konyar helped the Colonels win their fourth straight district title. The first two were Class 4 Northwestern District championships, while the last two have featured all 12 Class 3 and 4 Northwestern District schools competing against each other in meets with no postseason advancement implications.

James Wood had four of the top seven finishes on Tuesday to score 32 points. (The top 15 runners earned All-District honors.) Handley was second with 64, Sherando placed fifth (162) and Millbrook took sixth (172).

The gap between first and second (Kettle Run’s Suzanna Mancini was the runner-up in 19:17.8) was larger than the difference between second and eighth (55.4 seconds). But even with that huge lead, Konyar was sprinting with everything she had as she approached the finish line. When she crossed, she collapsed to the ground for several seconds before getting up.

Konyar’s goal was to break 18 minutes for the first time after nearly doing so at Millbrook’s Third Battle Invitational on the same course on Oct. 20, when she broke her school record with a time of 18:01.7.

Konyar couldn’t quite do it Tuesday for a couple of normal reasons. She said she felt a little sick, and she didn’t have anyone to push her.

Another reason is a little different. Unlike most runners who wear a watch, Konyar won’t gain any knowledge by glancing at her wrist. The watch she wore on Tuesday has been attached to her wrist since her freshman year for races, but that’s also the last year it worked.

“This is just my lucky watch,” said Konyar, laughing as she held up her wrist. “It used to work, but it’s just a good-luck charm. It’s like a joke on my team now.

“It came down to [three] seconds [from getting under 18] so that means my pacing overall is pretty good. I’m proud of how I did still.”

Konyar was also pleased with her team. Three of the Colonels’ top five runners had faster times on Tuesday than they did at the Third Battle meet.

“Our team did amazing today,” Konyar said. “We all ran really good times, so I’m really proud of them.”

The Colonels’ scoring five also featured senior Ruby Ostrander (third in 19:34.3, 15.7 seconds faster than Third Battle), junior Alina Kieffer (fourth in 19:34.8, 2.2 seconds faster), junior Katelyn Palmer (seventh in 20:08.9) and junior Lauren Thompson (17th in 21:07.4, 20.1 seconds faster).

Ostrander said she and Kieffer improved by taking a different approach from Third Battle.

The duo ran 30 seconds slower in the first mile (6:30) than they did last time, with the hopes that they would be stronger later in the race by doing that. It worked. They were well behind Handley sophomore EJ Mullins at the halfway point. But they passed Mullins in the last mile, and they both finished about 12 seconds in front of Mullins, who took fifth in 19:46.5.

“At one and a half [miles], we just kind of dropped it and went after EJ,” Ostrander said.

Ostrander missed the first half of the cross country season with a foot injury, but she’s feeling good physically. Ostrander was James Wood’s No. 2 runner and earned a state medal last year, but Tuesday marked the first time she was the Colonels’ No. 2 runner this season. If the team keeps performing like it is right now, she’ll be even more enthusiastic about the season.

“I’m really happy with how we’re working as a team, and not focusing on everything going on around us,” she said.

James Wood coach Matthew Lofton said the girls’ race played out the way he expected.

“I knew Handley would probably give us a little bit of a fight, but with our top four we thought we would be able to pull out the win,” Lofton said. “[Ostrander and Kieffer] catching EJ in the final mile showed how strong they are in the closing parts of the race.”

Handley coach Mark Stickley said Mullins has to be careful with going out too hard in the future. The Region 4D meet and the start of the postseason is next for Winchester-Frederick County schools. That will take place on Nov. 5 at the Poplar Forest course in Forest.

“She’s got to reign it in,” Stickley said. “You know Kate [Konyar is] the class of the field, so you’ve got to kind of let Kate do her thing and not worry about Kate, just worry about you. She probably put a little too much pressure on herself.

“At the end of the day, when you go out that hard, the easy thing is to keep falling back, falling back, and she did fight through all the way to the finish, so I’m really proud of her for doing that. Hopefully, she can tone down it a little bit next week and not just go crazy at the start.”

Overall, Stickley was pleased with Mullins and the rest of the team. The one negative was that No. 3 runner Sage Welpott wasn’t able to finish the race. Stickley said her shins were bothering her, and he told her to stop if she felt discomfort during the race in order to give her a better chance at being healthy for the Region 4D meet.

Handley was also led Tuesday by junior Ella Warren (sixth in 20:02.9), sophomore Seneca Welpott (15th in 20:53.8), freshman Jayleh Porter (16th in 20:59) and junior Stephanie Truban (22nd in 21:34.9).

“I’m ecstatic,” Stickley said. “We had eight runners under 22 minutes, and that’s amazing. James Wood set the bar high, and it looks like they’re improving, so kudos to them.”

Sherando’s scoring five runners were senior Gracie Defibaugh (11th in 20:50.6), sophomore Mia Adams (18th in 21:16.3), sophomore Regan Caplan (41st in 22:27.6), sophomore Alli Lawson (50th in 23:10.7) and sophomore Ariela Rivera (55th in 23:22.7).

Defibaugh improved by 1:13 from her time at Third Battle.

“Gracie had a really great race today,” Sherando coach Megan Roberts said. “She had to miss a couple of races, and then at Third Battle, she came back and she wasn’t happy with her time. We told her she was just shaking off the rust. Today, she kind of ironed out the wrinkles from last week, and she was ready to roll this week.”

Millbrook’s scoring runners were the freshman foursome of Marisol Lara (34th, 22:11.6), Adilyn Steinmetz (35th, 22:14.2), Aubrey Steinmetz (36th, 22:14.4) and Harper Weiss (39th, 22:24.4) and senior Caroline McCurry (40th, 22:27.1).

“We were kind of taking this as a training day,” Pioneers coach Jamie McCarty said. “We’ve got regionals in seven days, and we need to be A-plus for regionals, so I just wanted them to do a little bit of a workout today. But everybody ran what we hoped they were going to run, so we were satisfied what we got done there. I think we were fifth [in the virtual meet] coming in, and we took sixth doing a training run.”

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