This week Sweet Home’s cross-country teams may reveal themselves.
It was hard to tell just where the Huskies were at as they gutted their way through their third hard-core meet in just over a week on Wednesday, Sept. 23, in the Harrier’s Challenge at Schwartz Park outside of Cottage Grove.
The course includes a 75-meter climb at about a 30-degree angle that forced most runners to plodding walk.
That, the heat and 10 days of hard workouts left Sweet Home dragging – well behind Elmira’s boys, who showed up with 22 runners, which was not even their full team.
“We were definitely tired,” Coach Andrew “Keebler” Allen said. “This was our third meet in eight days, plus workouts. We’ve done a lot of traveling. Our closest meet has been about hour and a half away.”
The Cottage Grove meet included 22 teams, hailing from Southern Oregon to Sweet Home and east to La Pine and ranging from 6A-Division Grants Pass and Crater to 1A Mohawk and Triangle Lake.
Trey Reed was Sweet Home’s top finisher, well back in the pack at 22nd out of 89 runners in 19:24. Behind him in the varsity race were Ricky Yunke (40th, 20:39), Tanner Sayers (42nd, 20:53), Kobe Olsen (44th, 20:54), Noah Dinsfriend (52nd, 21:34), Allen Cuilla (58th, 21:41) and Julian Hesberg (59th, 21:48).
The varsity girls were led by Bethany Gingerich, 27th out of 66 runners in 25:31, followed by Kayleen Keeney (31st, 25:44), Sierra Swanson (35th, 25:55), Dana Hiett (43rd, 27:21) and Maria Daniels (55th, 29:05).
Allen said the traditional pre-race jog over most of the course came back to bite the team in this race, given the heat and their fatigue.
“They were closing in on the 1½ mark and they were dead,” he said of the race. “They were beyond what they could do.”
In the junior varsity race, Joe Rasmussen finished 23rd out of 84 runners , in 22:22. Behind him were Noah Taraski (35th, 23:14), Nelson Rodgers (36th, 23:14), Nick Rietz (38th, 23:20). Nick Tolman (39th, 23:26), Cameron Taber (42nd, 23:48), Sean Wolthuis (51st, 24:46), Jake Hindmarsh (63rd, 27:02) and Christian Baham (77th, 32:00). Faith Black was the only JV girl runner, finishing in 35:52.
Allen said the only “true standout” was Swanson, and “newbie” Black.
He said the team knew it was fatigued.”
“I think right now they’ve realized how much they’ve put in,” he said last week. “It caught up with them all at the same time. You can attribute at least 30 seconds to a minute to them walking that course (pre-race).
“The positive is that they were finishing right behind each other. They were running like a pack in both the varsity and JV race, though they weren’t necessarily in a pack. They were within eyesight of each other.”
This Saturday, the Huskies will have a chance to run a course without major hills for the first time in weeks. The Paul Mariman Invitational at Philomath will feature a field nearly entirely 4A teams and nearly all from the Willamette Valley and the coast.