SMITHFIELD, N.C. – The Richmond Senior High School cross country teams had a busy week following the delays caused by Hurricane Florence. The boys and girls teams raced in a Sandhills Athletic Conference meet on Tuesday, before taking a trip to Smithfield on Saturday to compete in the Smithfield-Selma Spartan Invitational.
On Tuesday, the Raiders and Lady Raiders hit the course in competition for the first time since their season opener at Purnell Swett High School back on Sept. 4. The 21-day break did not seem to affect junior Airel Brown. Brown finished in third place out of the 35 runners from Richmond, Hoke County and host Jack Britt high school. She led the Lady Raiders in the event with a time of 23:00.96 which was nearly two and-a-half minutes quicker than her finish at Swett.
Jack Britt dominated the SAC meet with nine of the top 14 finishers in the girls’ race coming from the host school. This led to a pretty close battle between Richmond and Hoke for second place.
Only the top seven finishers from each school earn points for their team. Joining Brown in the top 10 for Richmond was sophomore Gracelyn Weatherford. Weatherford finished in ninth place with a time of 25:58.46. When Jack Britt senior Julianna Clark crossed the finish line as the Lady Buccaneers’ seventh finisher, Hoke was leading the Lady Raiders for second place.
From that point, it was all Richmond. Junior Abby Calhoun (27:43), sophomore Zamiya McInnis (27:56), junior Sierra Ramsay (28:03), Allyson Leggett (28:20), and Analee Wyand (28:22) finished from 15th to 19th respectively. The swarm of green and gold crossing the line ahead of the final four Lady Buck runners was all Richmond needed to steal the No. 2 spot from Hoke.
In the boys race, junior Gerado Godinez (20:40, ninth place), sophomore Carson Jordan (21:19, 12th place), sophomore Joshua Wallace (22:52, 21st place), senior Tyler Parker (23:51, 25th place), senior Timothy Powell (24:03, 26th place), sophomore Bryon Coll (25:41, 34th place) and sophomore Will Thompson (26:03, 37th place) were the top seven to cross the line for Richmond. The Raiders finished in third under event winner Jack Britt and second-place Hoke County.
Brown continued to improve on her 5,000 meter run time in Smithfield on Saturday. She shaved another 14 seconds off of her Jack Britt time when she crossed the finish line at Smithfield-Selma with a time of 22:46. She finished in 11th place out of a very strong field of 60 runners.
Weatherford finished with the next best time for the Lady Raiders at 25:19, her season best. Calhoun finished with a 26:46 rounding out the top three runners for Richmond at the event. As a team, the Lady Raiders only managed to finish in seventh place out of the eight participating schools.
For the boys’ team, it was junior Joseph Nicholson leading the way for the Raiders. His time of 19:35 landed him in 29th place out of 78 runners. Godinez (21:06, 52nd place) and Jordan (21:09, 53rd place) were the second and third finishers for Richmond respectively. The Raiders finished in 10th overall out of the event’s 14 participating schools.
Both teams are back in action Tuesday at Hoke County High School at 5 p.m.
