Last Thursday, thunderstorms threw things into a mess for cross country meets involving area high schools. Here’s a few more results from two meets.
Newton’s boys competed in the Little Hawk Invitational at Iowa City Thursday. They finished fifth with 152 points. The Daily News had the individual results in Friday’s story on the meet, but not comments from Newton boys’ cross country coach Tom Bartello.
“Overall the kids ran hard. Christian Laube took 11th overall and freshman Justin Fischer ran a personal-best time as the Cardinals’ No. 3 runner (Thursday),” Bartello said. Fischer was 34th in 19 minutes, 59.7 seconds for the 5K race.
“We had a bit of a tough time as a team with a number of runners not feeling 100 percent during their race,” Bartello said. “I know not many runners finished with places or times they were hoping for, but everyone showed that their hearts are in the right place, even when their legs feel a few steps behind. We found some positive things to work on, but I’d rather have a tough meet at this point in the season than at districts or state.”
Also Jacob Arrowood was the lone Newton runner in the boys’ junior varsity race. He finished 100th in 21:57 in a field of 148 runners.
Newton hosts its junior high and high school invitational cross country meet Tuesday at Westwood Golf Course. The junior races begin at 4:15 p.m., followed by the high school varsity girls and boys starting at 5 p.m.
Teams competing in the Newton Invitational high school divisions are Newton, Des Moines Christian, Des Moines East, Grinnell, Knoxville, Marshalltown, Oskaloosa and West Marshall, along with the Des Moines Roosevellt girls, and Southeast Polk girls.
AT LYNNVILLE, only the girls' race was completed in the Lynnville-Sully Invitational. The storm washed out the varsity boys' and junior high races. Lynnville-Sully cross country coach Darin Arkema announced Sunday that those races will not be rescheduled because not enough schools were available Monday or Tuesday of this week.
In the confusion at the end of the girls’ race at Lynnville, two schools’ results were not turned into Arkema. Arkema released the revised results Sunday. Team places were not affected.
Prairie City-Monroe’s Rachel Stafford and Rachel Peter earned individual medals. Stafford ran the 4K course in 17:38 for ninth place. Peter placed 14th in 17:53. Shelby Palm finished 58th in 22:33 and Amber Beener was 78th in 30:21.
PCM hosts its invitational cross country meet this Thursday on the Monroe Golf Course. The junior varsity-varsity meet begins at 4:30 p.m.
Teams to compete at the PCM Invitational along with the host school are Colfax-Mingo, Collins-Maxwell/Baxter, Lynnville-Sully, Pella Christian, Ballard, Centerville, Clarke, Davis County, Durant, Montezuma, Pleasantville, Southeast Warren, Twin Cedars, and West Marshall.