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County runners advance to Semi-State
INDIANAPOLIS -- A chilly day yielded good running conditions for Putnam County cross country runners at the Ben Davis Regional Saturday as Eagle Kieffer Vittetow and Tiger Cub Emma Wilson advanced among others.
The Greencastle girls' team placed seventh while the South Putnam girls' took eighth.
The Greencastle boys' team placed ninth.
Wilson earned the red ribbon for Greencastle in the girls race, finishing 15 seconds behind Avon junior Taylor Nicholson and 15 seconds in front of the Zionsville brigade which took third, fourth, fifth and seventh to earn the regional win.
Wilson won't be the lone Putnam County runner at the Carmel Semi-State. She'll be joined by teammate Arianna Pershing who placed 29th and South Putnam rival Juliano DeLano.
"This weather was perfect and the course was so fast," DeLano said. "It really felt good and I was really positive and driven today. I've been waiting a really long time for this. It's my last year as a senior so it feels good to finally pull it off."
DeLano said she has been studying the course at Camel and is excited to compete next week for South Putnam, which was pleased with its times on the faster Ben Davis course.
"The team knew as a team and individually what we were up against," Eagle coach Brandon Welti said. "Everybody's primary goal was to run PRs (personal records) and try to compete with people we've been competing with all year. For the most part that's the way it turned out. Just about everybody ran PR's or close to it so definitely happy with the way things went."
"Juliana we knew would definitely be on the bubble," Welti continued. "It was going to be difficult. She was able to just sneak into that 10th spot. She ran the best race she's ever ran before. Knowing that this was potentially her last race helped fuel her and motivated her to run really well."
Eagle Alysha Nichols just missed the Semi-State cut off finishing behind DeLano but as a sophomore will have a good chance to earn the cut in the next two years.
The Greencastle team is full of underclassmen and while it'll lose Corrie Romer and Kat King to graduation, GHS coach Garry Anderson is confident in the improvement the Tiger Cubs will make.
"We didn't run as well as we wanted on the girls' side. They weren't as sharp as they had been for the sectional and conference," Anderson said. "Our practices had been pretty good throughout the week. The fall break coming before the regional did change some of their sleep and eating habits for that week. Seelye Stoffregen has been fighting a bug and fought real hard through the Sectional but the step up to the regional was a bit much for her.
"The girls' team for the most part is a very young team," he continued. "Emma Wilson, Sydney Lewis, Seelye Stofffregen and Mika Mozawa are all freshmen and will return with a years experience next season. Arianna Pershing is our lone sophomore and has steadily improved all season, as did the freshmen."
Cloverdale also had two female representatives on the course, as Chlesie Edwards finished 48th and Tori Szalay finished 58th.
Cloverdale also had a male in the race and the lone Clover Nick Blundell ran a personal best at Ben Davis.
"I thought we ran really well," CHS coach Andy Tyler said. "Nick PR'd. Tori PR'd and Chelsie was really close to a PR. It's fairly good running conditions. It's a little cold but once the guys got warmed they stayed in the sun. We kept improving all year and that's what we wanted to do. We had goals that we set that we made and now looking forward to track season."
Vittetow's time of 16:28 was fast enough to earn 19th in the boys' race and to advance him to Carmel.
"I was expecting to run a PR," Vittetow said. "Obliviously I did. This year it's been up and down but I decided to push it a lot. I decided to go at it hard compared to my last race here. That's exactly what I did and I finished really well."
Welti was pleased with his boys even though the Eagles were disappointed that one runner just missed the Semi-State cut.
"We knew Kieffer would get in," Welti said. "He'd have to run a pretty bad race to not get in. Michael Crossman just barely missed it. He knocked off a huge chunk of time to give himself a chance. He made it really close. We are sad for him but we are also very happy with the way he ran."
Joining the Eagle junior on the Greyhound course will be Greencastle's Clayton Wilson who placed 30th. Wilson finished with 16:44 and his time was fast enough to land him on the National Elites' team with Vittetow and Emma Wilson.
Anderson was pleased with the team effort against the stiff competition at the regional.
"We had several of the boys get personal best but the competition was very tough," Anderson said. "It was nice to see Pershing run more aggressive again. He has been under the weather for the last three or four weeks and wasn't able to give us 100 percent. Ben Gellman has really had a nice ending to the season. He has improved his time for the last five meets. I think he has learned how to race and has matured quite a bit this season. Most of our team returns next season so that will be a plus for the boys' team."
Anderson praised his freshmen as well as Corrie Romer for being a good senior leader all season. He hopes to improve his boys' times and plans to look for more runners at GHS to join the already competitive girls' team.
IHSAA Cross Country Regional No. 9
At Ben Davis
Boys' Team Results
1. Avon
2. Zionsville
3. Pike
4. Brownsburg
5. Decatur Central
9. Greencastle
Boys' Individual Results
1 Hariharan Sathyamurthy BROWNSBURG 12 15:26
2 Oliver Rigg ZIONSVILLE 12 15:47
3 Rhys Grealish AVON 11 15:48
4 Kyle Gross DECATUR CENTRAL 12 15:52
5 Marcus Ellington PIKE 12 16:02
6 Evan Tate Browning ZIONSVILLE 10 16:08
7 Sedrik Sweet DECATUR CENTRAL 12 16:09
8 Matt Everling AVON 12 16:11
9 Marcus Fierek BROWNSBURG 12 16:14
10 Jackson Martin ZIONSVILLE 11 16:14
19 Vittetow SOUTH PUTNAM 11 16:28
30 Clayton Wilson GREENCASTLE 11 16:44
42 Braden Pershing GREENCASTLE 11 17:11
45 Michael Crossman SOUTH PUTNAM 10 17:12
50 Cameron Lewis GREENCASTLE 11 17:15
58 Logan Vandermark SOUTH PUTNAM 11 17:42
64 Preston Headley GREENCASTLE 10 17:57
66 Ben Gellman GREENCASTLE 10 18:00
79 Jacob Crawley GREENCASTLE 11 18:33
83 Jacob Lewis Greencastle 12 18:45
Girls' Team Results
1. Zionsville
2.Avon
3. Plainfield
4. Pike
5. Ben Davis
7. Greencastle
8. South Puntam
Girls' Individual Results
2 Emma Wilson GREENCASTLE 9 18:03 5:50 I
29 Arianna Pershing GREENCASTLE 10 20:42
35 Julianna Delano SOUTH PUTNAM 12 21:11
36 Alysha Nichols SOUTH PUTNAM 10 21:12
44 Madeline McHugh SOUTH PUTNAM 10 21:31
45 Sydney Lewis GREENCASTLE 9 21:35
47 Katherina King GREENCASTLE 12 21:41
48 Chelsie Edwards CLOVERALE 9 21:50
52 Rachel Jones SOUTH PUTNAM 10 21:56
58 Victoria Szalay CLOVERALE 11 22:05 7:08
60 Corrie Romer GREENCASTLE 12 22:15
64 Samara Young SOUTH PUTNAM 9 23:05
65 Alex Fanning SOUTH PUTNAM 10 23:24
66 Seelye Stoffregen GREENCASTLE 9 23:29
72 Addison Blaydes SOUTH PUTNAM 10 26:02
75 Mika Mozawa GREENCASTLE 9 26:35