Sunday, December 2, 2012

All-Star meet is All East

In the drama of high school cross-country season, the curtain goes down after the final act, the state championships. After that, it's all wait-till-next-year and planning for track season. In Florida, though, the Florida Athletic Coaches Association offers a select group of seniors a chance at a cross-country encore, the FACA Senior Al-Star Cross-Country Meet. For more years than anyone cares to remember, the meet has been held in Tallahassee. The Capital City was a more appropriate site than ever this year, because the State Championships had just been held on the stage of Tallahassee's Apalachee Regional Park Cross-Country Course. And on Saturday morning, 1 December 2012, ARPX was the venue for the All-Star Meet for the fourth year in a row.


The meet opened at 9:00 am with the girls' 5K race. Four teams came to the starting line--the best senior girls of Florida's East vs. their counterparts of the state's North vs. the South vs. the East. 26 runners thundered across the meadows of ARPXC in a tight group. This wasn't any cross-country meet, or even the state championship, where you might wait long minutes for the seventh runner of a team lacking depth to finish. Every athlete in the All-Star field was a contender. It was more like the field of an invitational track race than like a typical cross-country race.


But even in a fast field some runners are faster. At the end of the first kilometer, three runners had opened a gap on the rest--Amber Johnson of Dr. Phillips High School competing for the East, Ellyn Snider of Spanish River HS running for the South, and Kaitlyn Campo of Olympia HS racing on the East team. They were trailed a few steps back by Catherine Blaney of Belleview HS, wearing the blue of the North team. That was the race for the next kilometer, with Snider content to remain tucked in behind Johnson and Campo. But the next kilometer took the runners for their first climb up the Wall, ARPX's most notorious hill. Snider made a break, and at the top of the Wall, the halfway point of the race, she was four seconds out in front. Blaney moved up to fight Johnson and Campo for the second position. At three kilometers Ellyn Snider was maintaining her lead over Catherine Blaney and Kaitlyn Campo, while Amber Johnson had faded back into fourth. Snider widened her lead until the final 200 meters and the charge for the finish line. Campo passed Blaney on that final stretch and began to close on Snider, but Snider was too far ahead. Ellyn Snider won the 2012 FACA Senior All-Star title, crossing the finish line in 18:44. Kaitlyn Campo was runner-up in 18:48 and Blaney finished third in 18:50. Amber Johnson placed fourth in 19:21, managing to stay ahead of a closing Scarlett Fox. Fox ran 19:26 to take fifth for the West.



Led by Campo and Johnson, the East team won the girls' competition with 33 points. Scarlett Fox headed the West team's 47-point total, good for the runner-up spot. Blaney's third-place finish led off the North team's third place in the team standings with a score of 72. In spite of Snider's win, the South team totalled 74 points and placed fourth.


Team Standings, Girls
  1. East, 33 points
  2. West, 47 points
  3. North, 72 points
  4. South, 74 points

Girls Results
  1. 18:43.60 ~ Ellyn Snider (South)
  2. 18:47.23 ~ Kaitlyn Campo (East)
  3. 18:49.77 ~ Catherine Blaney (North)
  4. 19:20.52 ~ Amber Johnson (East)
  5. 19:25.44 ~ Scarlett Fox (West)
  6. 19:27.90 ~ Holly Wooley (East)
  7. 19:28.65 ~ Saphara Harrell (West)
  8. 19:31.78 ~ Ivy Chastain (North)
  9. 19:32.71 ~ Regan Farrow (East)
  10. 19:34.05 ~ Briana Jackson (West)
  11. 19:39.82 ~ Chelsea Manning (West)
  12. 19:56.99 ~ Mackenzie Dummer (East)
  13. 19:58.21 ~ Molly Price (South)
  14. 19:59.46 ~ Amanda Spring (West)
  15. 20:03.48 ~ Rachel Licea (South)
  16. 20:07.27 ~ Hannah Loder (North)
  17. 20:08.77 ~ Stephanie Cajas (West)
  18. 20:13.47 ~ Elizabeth Harper (East)
  19. 20:13.66 ~ Emily Perkinson (East)
  20. 20:24.29 ~ Natalie Novak (West)
  21. 20:30.05 ~ Danielle Turk (North)
  22. 20:32.80 ~ Lea Tardanico (South)
  23. 20:41.06 ~ Samara Taylor (South)
  24. 21:13.64 ~ Julia Magill (East)
  25. 21:41.00 ~ Teresa Duncan (North)
  26. 21:53.36 ~ Elizabeth Santoro (North)

The boys' 5K race went off at 9:30 am. Leonard High School athlete Salvador Medrano, wearing the green of the South team, launched himself into the lead, and was still setting pace for the field at the one kilometer mark. Less than half a kilometer later, though, Medrano had been overtaken and soon ceased to be a factor in the race. The new leaders were Aesop Brown of Fort Myers HS and Bobby Ormsby of Cypress Lake HS, both running for the West. But Ormsby dropped out, and at three kilometers Brown was in sole possession of the lead. Four second back, Dan Fernandez of Columbus HS and Tristan Kattenberg of Holy Trinity Academy shared the runner-up spot, chasing Brown. Fernandez dropped Kattenberg, but only lost ground to Brown. Brown went on to win with a 15:40, with the South team's Fernandez placing second in 15:46. Kattenberg held on to third for the East with a 15:51.



Kattenberg was followed over the line by another East runner, Daniel Salas, as the East put five scorers into the top 15 to edge out the West 43 to 44 for the FACA All-Star title. Led by a seventh-place 16:11 finish by Garrett Westlake of P. K. Yonge HS, the North team totalled 56 points to take third. Runner-up Daniel Fernandez was the only South runner in the top ten; the team placed fourth with 76 points.


It was actually Aesop Brown's third race at ARPXC this season, and it was his fastest. Brown had run 15:46 on the 5K course back in October in the FSU Invitational where he placed sixth, and 15:44 in the State Championship on 17 November 2012 where he placed fifth in the class 3A race. I asked him how this third outing compared.


"It was more fun," he said. "Because this time I won."


Team Standings, Boys
  1. East, 43 points
  2. West, 44 points
  3. North, 56 points
  4. South, 76 points

Boys Results
  1. 15:39.54 ~ Aesop Brown (West)
  2. 15:46.00 ~ Daniel Fernandez (South)
  3. 15:50.45 ~ Tristan Kattenberg (East)
  4. 16:05.61 ~ Daniel Salas (East)
  5. 16:07.67 ~ Zainelabdin Fator (West)
  6. 16:08.70 ~ Lars Benner (West)
  7. 16:10.04 ~ Garrett Westlake (North)
  8. 16:12.90 ~ Thomas Carroll (North)
  9. 16:14.18 ~ Raul Ramirez (East)
  10. 16:14.94 ~ Travis Covert (North)
  11. 16:20.07 ~ Matt Magee (West)
  12. 16:20.88 ~ Caleb Licht (East)
  13. 16:24.19 ~ Salvador Medrano (South)
  14. 16:24.47 ~ Alex Godfrey (North)
  15. 16:24.78 ~ John Lindsey (East)
  16. 16:28.25 ~ Fabian Delgado (South)
  17. 16:29.90 ~ Harrison Edwards (North)
  18. 16:32.79 ~ Kentre Patterson (North)
  19. 16:37.50 ~ Lucas Shannon (North)
  20. 16:38.39 ~ Charles Bengtson (South)
  21. 16:39.74 ~ Tim Bulger (North)
  22. 16:44.80 ~ Tyler Bess-Lima (West)
  23. 16:52.55 ~ Tyler Biles (West)
  24. 16:54.81 ~ Peyton Bailey (East)
  25. 17:04.03 ~ John Profitt (East)
  26. 17:07.12 ~ Samuel Luttier (South)
  27. 17:18.90 ~ Justin Schanze (East)
  28. 17:21.68 ~ William Fay (South)
  29. 17:23.97 ~ Tyler Bell (South)
  30. 17:27.50 ~ Giovanni Herrera (South)

FACA Senior All-Star Cross-Country Champions, 1997-2012
DATEBOYSGIRLS
6 DEC 1997 115:31, Courtney Chambers18:44, Erin Merten
1998
4 DEC 1999 215:25, Dan Cook18:31, Beth Lukens
2 DEC 2000 315:31, Sean Jefferson18:28, Anna Brew
3 DEC 2001 415:02, Nick Wilson17:54, Cathlene Willy
7 DEC 2002 515:19, Ryder Leary19:34.40, Allie Hunter
22 NOV 200315:48, Alex Miletich18:41, Devin Gapstur
15 NOV 200415:34, Bryan Sharkey17:33, Jennifer Simpson
22 NOV 200515:37, Steven Bell17:42, Kelly Parrish
17 NOV 200615:24, Michael Anderson18:34, Kaitlin Shiver
1 DEC 200715:23, Joseph Franklin18:40, Devin Spoerle
6 DEC 2008 616:05, Bret Butler18:20, Juliana Stern
5 DEC 2009 716:08, Sean Rynning18:13, Jana Stolting
4 DEC 201015:44, Tyler Cardillo18:29, Teresa Ristow
3 DEC 201115:46, Chris Godwin18:23, Anne-Marie Blaney
1 DEC 201215:40, Aesop Brown18:44, Ellyn Snider
1 In 1997 the meet was at Spruce Creek HS
2 In 1999 the meet was at Sperling Sports Complex in DeLand, FL
3 In 2000 the meet was at Lake Mary HS
4 From 2001 to 2007 the meet was at the Miccosukee Greenway in Tallahassee
5 Starting in 2002 the race distance was increased from three miles to five km
6 In 2008 the meet was at Maclay School in Tallahassee
7 From 2009 to 2012 the meet was at Apalachee Regional Park in Tallahassee


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Posted by Herb Wills at 7:42 PM
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