West Coast Report (Week 9)
by West Coast Correspondent John Stevenson for DistancePreps.com
1A and 2A Districts:
Many athletes had great start to the postseason with many doubles.
The following runners dominated their districts with 1600 and 3200 doubles: Cardinal Mooney standout Grace Casagrande in 1A District 10, her teammate Cal Davidson-Turner, Canaan Meester-Kitterman of Bayshore, Sarah Candiano of Evangelical Christian School at 1A District 11, Claire Snyder of Academy of Holy Names, Leonel Delacruz and Anita Munoz of Immokalee at 2A District 12.
Other notable performances to move on to Regionals are Abigayle Weinfeld and Haley Blem of Lemon Bay, Hannah Brookover of Calvary Christian in the 1600 and Alex Eaton of Shorecrest in the 1600 and 3200.
Looking ahead at Regionals, I think 1A-Region 3 is looking really good for the 1600. We have Eaton, Brookover, Candiano, and Casagrande vying for Regional championship!
Now for the 3A and 4A, the only big meets this past week were at Winter Park for the Brian Jaeger Elite Classic and Wally Keller at Charlotte High.
Wally Keller Invitational
At Charlotte, the Estero girls dominated the 1600 by taking 3 of the top 4 led by senior Katie Slater with a big PR of 5:02 and putting her name in the mix as one of the top milers in the state. Second place was Katie's teammate and USF signee Bethany Jenkins with 5:14.
In the 3200, two freshmen ladies took the top positions. Maura Rose Poling of Lely took home the gold and Devin Molloy of Barron Collier was right behind Maura. The 3200 at 3A Region-3 is going to be wild with Emily Edwards, Molloy, Poling, Bethany Jenkins, Araceli Leon, and Angelina Grebe.
In the 800, Emily Edwards showed her dominance by running a season best 2:14. She took the victory by over 4 seconds to Estero's Katie Slater.
Estero showed their depth and strength in the 800 by winning over 10 seconds in the 4x800 over Lely. The defending 3A champions aren't giving Miami Northwestern the gold yet!
On the boy's side, the 1600 showed to be a tactical race that was controlled by Coral Reef's Kurt Convey going 4:23 followed by Ft. Myers Tyler Bennett in 4:25. There were 8 guys under 4:30.
In the 3200, Alejandro Pedraza of Golden Gate pulled away from Estero's Dillion Vallette and Ft. Myers Stephen Fedec for the victory with 9:49.
No one went sub 2:00 in the 800 but the victory went to Garrison Kalvin of Naples with 2:00.27 over Sarasota Riverview's Bryce Vokus.
The day started off very exciting with the boy's 4x800 race where North Port narrowly defeated Estero by 1 second with a school record of 8:06.
Looking ahead at 3A and 4A districts:
The district of destruction would have to be 3A-District 11 where you have two powerhouse distance teams in Estero and Ft. Myers. There is a chance a girl runs a sub 2:20 in the 800 or sub 5:15 in the 1600 and not get to regionals.
On the boys side, there is 7 runners who are sub 4:30 in the 1600 and 5 sub 10:00 in the 3200. Those are great numbers for a district meet. Other than that district, I donít see any top tier male or female having an issue getting to Regionals.
West Coast Correspondent John Stevenson
I've been coaching girls cross country since 2010 at Sarasota High School where the girls took 2nd place in the 2013 3A Cross Country State Final. In 2011, I took over the distance track program for both the boys and girls and in 2014 I took the realm as Head Coach of the Boys Track program at SHS. I've been a competitive runner that enjoys the longer distances and triathlete since 2007 and competed in many distances from sprint triathlon to ironman.
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