With the high school cross country season well underway, local teams have fared well as they size up their competition for CIF championships.
Competing in CIF-Southern Section Division 1, Redondo hopes to break into the top ten after strong performances at the 36th annual Woodbridge Cross Country Classic last Saturday.
Redondo’s girls team took first place in the Gold Division with the Sea Hawk’s Isabella Landry crossing the finish line first with a time of 19 minutes, 36.6 seconds.
Also running for Redondo were Peyton Heiden (6th, 18:30.6), Trinity Leonard (10th, 18:43.4), Jadyn Bell (16th, 19:557.5), Dana Focardi (19th, 19:58.0), Isabel Ramirez (28th, 19:18.2) and Teja Skalko (46th, 19:41.8).
In the Boys Rated competition, Redondo placed 6th and was led by Ethan Comeaux whose time of 14:41.6 is currently the 15th fastest time in the state
Helping the sea Hawk’s cause were Benjamin Tait (24th, 15:18.7), Brian Adler (31st, 15:28.1), Sangjun Lee (72nd, 15:58.7), Farooq Tariq (98th, 16:15.9), Cade Erickson (113th, 16:25.2) and Rudy Orre (130th, 16:40.6).
Mira Costa will be traveling to Oregon this weekend to compete in the Nike Portland XC and held out its top runners at Woodbridge to prepare for the competition.
Despite holding out 12 of its best runners, Mira Costa’s girls team placed 8th with Olivia Hacohen (13th, 18:49.8), Jessie Gregson-Williams (31st, 19:24.0), Ellie Lee-Morrow (50th, 19:50.4), Sofia Vialpando (57th, 19:54.4), Cara Martinez (58th, 10:55.2), Eliza Murray (64th, 20:02.8) and Amanda Costley (126th, 20:09.5) gaining valuable experience.
Mira Costa’s boys team is ranked No. 4 in CIF-SS Division 2 but only brought lower level boys teams to Woodbridge. The Lady Mustangs are ranked No. 7 in Division 2.
With a full squad, Mira Costa’s girls won the Division 2 senior team championship at the Laguna Hills Invitational Sept. 10.
The Mustangs had five runners place in the top 20 including winner Melia Chittenden (18:06), Emily Jones (6th, 19:51), Anna Guerrero (7th, 20:12), Sierra Andrade (11th, 20:28) and Ellie Lee-Morrow (19th, 21:45).
The boys team finished 9th and were led by Caleb Llorin (9th, 16:08), Michael Yaskowitz (13th, 16:22) and Matthew Arruda (17th, 16:34).
At the Cool Breeze Invitational Sept. 3 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Redondo’s boys and girls won championships in the Non-Seeded Division.
Comeaux (15:16.33) and Tait (15:18.43) went 1-2 and Adler (15:50.96) finished 8th for the boys while Landry (3rd, 18:31.00) and Heiden (8th, 18:49.40) led the girls.
Mira Costa ran in the highly-competitive Seeded Division with the day highlighted by Chittenden’s 2nd place finish at 16:56.77 which is the 13th fastest time in state for girls.
