CUMBERLAND, Maine — The cross country season officially came to a close for the Houlton/GHCA runners at the state championship race at the Twin Brook Recreation facility Nov. 2.
“The kids tackled the challenging 5k trail system head on and all managed to do fairly well,” coach Chris Rines said. “The girls team placed 7th ahead of MSSM and Fort Kent and just a handful of points away from 6th place Waynflete. Going into the meet, the virtual predictions had the Houlton/GHCA runners in sixth place and we thought we might even be able to make a run for 5th but there’s a reason they run the race and unfortunately we fell just shy of those predictions.”
Houlton’s Ellie Grant nears the finish line at the state Class C cross country championships in Cumberland Nov. 2. (Photo courtesy of Chris Rines)
Teagan Ewings managed to have her best finish at a state championship race, capping off a strong season as the team’s top runner. Ewings placed 13th in the race with a time of 22 minutes, 0.2 seconds.
Other results for the girls team were: 23, Emmalyne Drake, 22:51.95; 50, Makenna Cooley, 24:09.61; 53, Ellie Grant, 24:20.16; 74, Jeannelle Ross, 26:04.24; and 82, Hope Royal, 32:55.34. Full results for the girls meet can be found here: http://www.sub5.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/classcgirlsstate2019.txt
For the boys, the field started out fast and it pretty much stayed that way, the coach said. “The usual strategy of starting out conservatively and picking off runners as you go worked for only so long before our two qualifiers ran out of course to work with,” Rines said.
Daniel Ross placed 25th with a time of 18:44.40, while Jeremy Stone was 32nd at 18:52.94.
“They ran together for the most part like they have all season, and through one mile they were placing about in the 50s, but were able to climb in the ranks to about that top 30 position into mile two,” the coach said.
The complete boys results can be found here: http://www.sub5.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/classcboystate2019.txt
