State-ranked Hawks battle stacked cross country fields at Central College

PELLA — Both Lynnville-Sully cross country teams faced stacked fields at the Pella High School Dutch Cross Country Invitational on Saturday.

The state-ranked Hawks though held their own against other Class 1A ranked schools, and the L-S girls placed sixth in the 10-team field while the boys were seventh in the 13-team field.

Both teams also finished above conference rivals English Valleys and North Mahaska at Central College.

“On a really nice course that can be challenging yet produce fast times, the Hawks had an outstanding second meet of the season after a really solid week of training,” L-S head cross country coach Darin Arkema said. “Both teams were up against some tough competition, too.”

The top two finishers on both teams ended up in the exact same positions in the girls’ and boys’ 5K races.

Emma Parkinson was 16th in the girls’ race with a time of 21 minutes, 6.4 seconds and Colton Alberts was 16th in the boys race in 17:03.1.

Mandeesa Vos, who is ranked 21st in 1A, was 20th in the girls’ race in 21:19.4 and Blake Wilmesmeier matched her in the boys’ race in 17:18.3.

The other scoring runners for the L-S girls were Breah Lowry (22:18.3) in 43rd, Peyton Sharp (22:52.1) in 54th and Isabelle Vos (23:04.8) in 56th.

Katelyn Nikkel (23:24.1) was a non-scoring runner in 62nd and Isabelle Vos made her varsity prep debut.

“The five girls who raced last week all saw improved times ranging from 13 seconds all the way up to 1 minute and 30 seconds,” Arkema said. “Almost everyone improved from the first meet to the second met, ranging from 35 seconds better to 2 minutes and 10 seconds better.”

Sam Terlouw (19:13.8), Madden Gunsaulus (19:14.4) and Ethan Dunsbergen (19:26.5) were the other scoring runners for the L-S boys. That trio hit the finish line in 64th, 65th and 69th, respectively.

Evan Arkema (19:36.6) and Keegan Schnell (19:43.4) were non-scoring runners in 74th and 78th, respectively.

“There was only two races, one girls and one boys, so all competitors varsity and junior varsity raced together,” Arkema said. “That made for some large groups at the starting line. Our girls did a better job of getting off the line and getting up in the race and not allowing others who shouldn’t be in front of them get in their way. I thought overall their efforts and determination on the uphill portions of the course were good.”

Class 3A No. 1 Gilbert won the boys’ meet title with 31 points, and 3A No. 2 Pella was the runner-up with 43 points. Class 3A No. 6 ADM (110), 2A No. 1 Chariton (128) and Platte County in Missouri (131) completed the top five.

Class 2A No. 6 Pella Christian (162), 1A No. 12 Lynnville-Sully (198), 1A No. 20 Baxter (256), Oskaloosa (258), English Valleys (286), Collins-Maxwell (291), Mount Pleasant (303) and North Mahaska (347) finalized the 13-team field.

“The boys were able to beat Baxter today by a 58-point margin, and I know that Baxter was without their No. 1 runner,” Arkema said. “So who knows how things play out if he had ran. My main focus and satisfaction was in the improved efforts by our group of guys and the focus they had in today’s race to take steps forward in improvement.”

Class 3A No. 2 Cainan Dunham of Pella won the boys’ race in 15:10.6. Gilbert’s Logan Bleich was the runner-up in 15:20.5.

Class 3A No. 1 Pella won the girls’ meet championship with 16 points. The Lady Dutch finished 1-2-4-5-7 in the race.

Class 3A No. 11 Gilbert (90), 3A No. 14 ADM (117) Platte County in Missouri (118) and 2A No. 9 Pella Christian (130) were next to complete the top five.

Class 1A No. 7 Lynnville-Sully (159), 1A No. 11 Collins-Maxwell (167) and 1A No. 13 English Valleys (194) were next and Oskaloosa (215) and North Mahaska (224) completed the field.

Class 3A No. 1 Marissa Ferebee of Pella won the girls’ 5K race in 18:29.1.

Class 3A No. 2 Elsie Brenneman of Pella was the runner-up in 18:36.5.