Columbus North’s (from left) Justin Reckers, Graham Pumphrey, Denton Sluder, Jace Works, Sam Steinmetz and Joseph Day run side-by-side toward the finish line Tuesday at CERA Sports Park in Columbus.
Tommy Walker | For The Republic
After seeing their annual cross-country dual meet canceled because of the heat last year, Columbus North and Columbus East had much cooler weather in which to run Tuesday.
Numerous Bull Dogs and Olympians took advantage of that weather to post personal-best times. That included North sophomore Joseph Day, who ran a personal-best 16 minutes, 3.91 seconds for 5,000 meters (3.1 miles) on East’s course at Ceraland to lead the Bull Dogs to a 15-50 victory.
“We just wanted to go out hard and stick together,” Day said. “I surprised myself. I wasn’t expecting to be able to do it. It was a good PR, and it was nice to see what I could do.”
Day was one of six North boys to run together throughout the race and finish within less than a half-second of each other. He was followed by Graham Pumphrey (16:04.06), Sam Steinmetz (16:04.13), Justin Reckers (16:04.21), Jace Works (16:04.28) and Denton Sluder (16:11.73).
“We were just told to run together as a team, and I think that’s really important,” Steinmetz said. “It was actually the goal for the top five, but a couple of our guys just ran up. It’s good experience to do that. It was really fun. It’s a great way to get started with the season. We’re really happy with it.”
The Bull Dogs’ Rohan Norris finished seventh in 16:11.73. Logan Vanzant took eighth in 16:26.65, while Leyton Hottell was ninth (16:55.48) and Garrett Perfetto 10th (17:03.06).
“We sent our boys out hard,” North coach Rick Sluder said. “They just happened to be really good. They pushed it. That’s a really fast time and a PR for a lot of them. They ran really hard, and they sticked together. I’m really excited for those top six, seven, 10 guys. When you put six guys running 16 minutes together, that’s pretty good.”
Norman Dickson was the first Olympians runner in 11th in 17:03.06. Elijah Clore finished 19th in 18:05.44, while Maddox Hult was 26th (18:46.90), Riley Wilson 29th (19:11.40), Cullen Fullerton 30th (20:12.97), Zayden Weatherford 40th (21:59.26) and Beckett Mocas 41st (22:00.99).
“We’re just coming off of a race on Saturday, so for him to come back and run close to the time that he did on Saturday on a little bit of a slower course with some heavy legs, I ws really proud to see that effort,” East boys coach Gabe Ocasio said. “Some of them are seeing some effects from Saturday’s race, but no excuses, that just what was presented to us today, but it’s OK, we just reload for the next one. I like to preach that we don’t rebuild at Columbus East anymore, we reload. So instead of having all these excuses an pouting about the race, we are now just going to reload for the next one. This is super early, and we’re just looking to more racing and more training.”
Meanwhile, the girls race went much like the preceding boys race, with several Bull Dogs running together in a 15-50 victory. Juniors Emma Lowther and Tristan Works were a little ahead of the other runners, with Lowther finishing in 20:00.84 and Tristan Works 20:00.92.
“Our original strategy was to have our top 12 run together as a big group, and it got away from Tristan and I a little bit,” Lowther said. “We were trying to also run our own race, but try to be close to the team, as well.”
“We were definitely running smooth, and running together really helped, and I think we were pushing our team pretty well,” Tristan Works added. “I think our team did really well. We came in and set a good race for the season.”
Kodi Smith finished third in 20:06.27, Kylie Brinksneader fourth in 20:16.25 and Adira Sluder fifth in 20:19.07 for North, which had the top 16 runners in the girls race. Ainsley Sherlock took sixth in 20:22.41, while Hazel Sasse was seventh (20:34.52), Rendy Zhong eighth (21:03.48), Rendy Zhong ninth (21:03.48), Maria Gaggiano Camargo 10th (21:08.28), Reece Peeples 11th (21:34.01), Lucy Nevins 12th (22:00.30), Sydney Madden 13th (22:09.49), Abi Megel 14th (22:09.79), Brooklyn Donner 15th (22:59.84 and Andi Carothers 16th (23:12.37).
“We kind of had a specific plan to run certain paces hard, and they were able to do that,” Rick Sluder said. “We had little packs running together, not on purpose, but were just racing hard together. Our first 8-9-10 girls looked really strong together. Emma and Tristan looked great up front, Kodi was next and then we had some more juniors and seniors with Adira and Ainsley right behind them and then came some freshmen and sophomores. Our girls ran really strong tonight. We were really excited to start the season off that strongly.”
“I think it showed a big step in our training, just to show off what we did in the summer,” Lowther added. “It was a good race, and I enjoyed being with the team.”
Ainslee Shaw and Elizabeth Sztaba finished 17th and 18th in 23:19.85 and 23:21.92 to lead the Olympians. Abby Collins took 24th in 24:53.89, while Trinity Burns was 27th (25:45.10), Brooke Newell 28th (25:48.41), Delaney Rogers 30th (26:55.35) and Daphne May 31st (27:58.58).
“It was a good race for our girls,” East girls coach Jesse Shoaf said. “The weather broke this year, which is unusual, so everybody was just out trying to do their best times today, and we had a lot of times that were really good. Our top five, I’m really happy how they packed up. Our 1 and 2 came in really tight together, and our 3 and 4 came in tight together, so that’s our goal, to keep them moving forward and getting a little bit closer together in our times as we move forward with the season.”
