The "Run-Down": Puma Classic @ Fernhill Park

 

Almost every great event takes a lot of planning and preparation. Today's results for the Panthers at Fernhill Park were no exception. The plan for the past two months was to focus on running fast times on this course against great competition. Our execution of workouts and races lately has been excellent, and thus the results today were nothing short of excellent! So here is how things shaped up for the Panthers...

 

The future Varsity girls by far had the biggest group of lifetime PR's. Freshman Serene Dunn improved to 27:50.4, nearly 2 minutes faster than ever before. Amazingly that was the smallest PR for the group of four that PR'ed! Our other frosh in the race, Kelsey Lagerquist, jumped passed the 25's and found the mid 24's (24:23) while learning to extend her kick to 250+ meters out, a very mature athletic concept. She was our top Future Varsity girl today. The Kari half of the Sophomore Johnson twins found herself in a race without her mirror image and somehow managed a 3:14 PR! 24:32.9 is probably something she wouldn't have dreamed about a few weeks ago. Edging her out for top spot on the improvement board was Sophomore Devyn Reuter. Devyn's 3:14 PR was not expected considering she had a 3+ minute PR 46 hours earlier!

 

Sophomore Darian Tierney lead the way for the Panther FV boys, breaking 20 minutes and moving the boys one step closer towards a major team goal. His 19:50.4 was a 1:02 PR relative to Thursday's home course performance. Afterwards, he was serenaded with bagpiped "Happy Birthday" and presented with cake for his star birthday (16 on the 16th). Junior Ryan Strecker tossed in a 4 second PR (22:24.9) relative to last year and Freshman Aaron Dunn passed people left and right along the way to a 2:18 PR (23:18.0).

 

The Varsity girls finally had the day they have been waiting for. 5 of the 7 girls PR'd, and impressively getting 5 girls under 25 for the first time this season. This was accomplished without team front runner Kendall! Our T-Squad battled it out with each other virtually every step of the way, passing many in the process. Sophomore Tara Duey edged out Senior Taneal Tanner at the line as they both finished in 22:25. This was an 82 second PR for Tara and Taneal's 4th best time of her life! Sophomore continues to shape time off her PR every meet, skipping over the 24's to 23:49.9, a 2:09 improvement! Other PR's of the day included Sophomore Kaitlyn Johnson (1:09), Senior Chloe Kilgore (1:37 in spite of a Charlie Horse) and Freshman Brooke Croeni (1:55). Based on all of these improvements, the Panther ladies have established themselves as a potential state qualifier, something that did not see conceivable 3 weeks ago considering the level of experience our girls have.

 

Our Varsity boys did shine in the showcase race, capturing 5 PR's, with Seniors Michael Huck missing by only 10 seconds and Brendan Casey by 15. The other Senior, Dylan Croeni, was not as fluent as he normally is, but found way to battle the pain and chop 13 more seconds off his School Record. His fifth place finish broke his winning streak, but it took exceptional runners to do it. Sophomore Sean Eustis demonstrated that he is the best soph in 2A state for Washington, and the third best in all of Washington. BTW, it is Dylan's fault that Sean's performance today was not a school record. Coach Frost's prediction of Sophomore Isaac Stinchfield's final time was more accurate the mine, as I undersold him (projecting a 35 second PR). Isaac's 53 second PR was the biggest on the V. Boys squad. Classmate Josh Banks squeezed out a 6+ second PR while lone Junior on Varsity Noah Collins found 31 seconds to trim off, but knowing that a better race strategy will materialize 10-15 seconds more for him. Team wise, it can be argued that the performance is the best in WHS history (since running 5K), as the 1999 team (11th in state) averaged 17:27 (through 5 runners) while we averaged 17:05 today!

 

Are we ready for State? Maybe the better question is "Is the State ready for us?"

 

Coach Terry L. Howard

 

 

Here are the line scores:

 

Varsity Boys

 

Mile 1

Mile 2

5000 M

 

Dylan

5th

4:54

9:58

15:28.2

P.R.

Sean

29th

5:07

10:18

16:07.1

P.R. 

Isaac

96th

5:18

10:45?

17:02.9

P.R.

Noah

154th

5:31

11:27 

18:14.6

P.R.

Brendan

161st

5:27

11:37

18:33.8

S.B.

Michael

167th

5:39

11:52

18:55.2

S.B. 

Josh

169th

5:41

11:58

19:03.7

P.R. 

of 169

 

Future Varsity Boys

 

 

 

Darian

143rd

6:13

12:41

18:50.4

P.R.

Ryan

194th

6:48

14:13

22:24.9

P.R. 

Chism

196th

6:45

14:21

22:37.0

 

Aaron

204th

7:17

14:56

23:18.0

P.R.

 

of 214

 

 

 

 

Varsity Girls

 

 

 

 

 

Tara

94th

7:08

14:27

22:25.2

P.R.

Taneal

95th

7:08

14:29

22:25.5

S.B.

Kalli

135th

7:44

15:11

23:49.9

P.R.

Brandi

150st

7:36

15:34

24:13.9

S.B.

Brooke

162nd

7:45

15:59

24:50.2

P.R.

Kaitlyn

167th

7:45

16:21

25:44.0

P.R.

Chloe

169th

7:47

16:21

25:45.9

P.R.

 

of 181

 

 

 

 

Future Varsity Girls

 

 

 

 

Kelsey

99th

7:37

15:52

24:23.0

P.R.

Kari

104th

7:37

15:52

24:32.9

P.R.

Devyn

126th

7:55

16:38

26:05.4

P.R.

Serene

144th

8:04

17:34

27:50.4

P.R.

Darby

155th

8:55

19:47

33:02.9

 

 

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