CROSS COUNTRY HOUNDS
There were few things for the Jones County cross country runners to be disappointed about coming away from Saturday morning’s Bob Blastow Invitational in Whitesburg in a field featuring multiple schools from larger classifications.
The expectation was for there to be faster times due to the layout of the course, and those expectations were met with multiple personal records being set as the Greyhounds were third and the Lady Greyhounds fifth in their respective races.
For the second weekend in a row, Luke Thornton set a county record, running a 16:15.24 to finish sixth. What’s more is that Gavin Robinson, who finished 12th, had a time of 16:41.96 that would have broken the county record before Thornton shattered it last weekend.
“They impressed me again. Luke did it again and ran about 15 seconds better than last weekend. Gavin broke the old county record,” Jones County head coach Geoff Moore said. “They ran well. We went up on Friday night and got a good course preview and did really well. I was happy with the way we did.”
Other than the top two finishers, the Greyhounds placed their top five runners in the top 40 overall. Tyler Marshall was 24th with a time of 17:00.46, Grady Newby was close behind in 27th at 17:09.48 with a time of 17:33.78 giving Andrew Marshall a 40th-place finish.
“They are competing with each other. That stuff matters to them. I don’t have to tell them. They have an index card. We do goals each Friday before the race about where they want to be and what they want to do and put it all on a card and the team and I grade those on Monday and Tuesday,” Moore said. “They know that they’ll be held accountable. They strive; this team runs hard for each other and holds each other accountable. This group is different. They do the little things you are supposed to do and don’t do the little things you aren’t supposed to do like diet, sleep and all that stuff that matters in this sport.”
The overall effort for JCHS was an angle of consistency that will be key as the season goes on against the likes of Union Grove, who was also at Saturday’s meet.
“They’ve improved. I told our guys that this isn’t a slam dunk this year. Looking at the times, we’d have beaten them, but it would have been close,” Moore said. “They’ve picked up some guys on top of what they had last year.”
A trio of top-11 finishers led the Lady Hounds with Lilly Palmer running a 19:52.93 to finish fourth, Camryn Wommack in eighth with a time of 20:38.25 and freshman Isabella Sanchez in 11th with a time of 20:54.60.
“Lilly crushed it. I thought she’d win the race, but ran out of gas near the end,” Moore said. “It was a really gutsy performance.”
Helping to post an overall team finish in the top five were Emily Patat and Addison Newby in 61st and 65th with times of 23:55.65 and 24:13.78.
“I was really happy with how they did; not a lot of complaints,” Moore said.
