2 time state champ wins Girls race by more than a minute; Thomas pulls away to win Boys race; Salem Boys, Rochester Girls pick up team championships

By Michael Newman

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Edwardsville, Ill – The history of the First to the Finish Kickoff Meet (formally called the Metro-East Lutheran Debut Invitational) has been fraught with bad weather conditions. The end of August in the metro St. Louis area usually is hot with high humidity. Two years ago, the Boys race had to be called off because the heat index at race time was over 100 degrees.

This year the weather cooperated if you can call mid 70’s with 90% humidity with overcast skies at the start of the Girls Race. It was better than the alternative. The high humidity did not affect two time Illinois 1A State Champion Anna Sophia Keller. The Effingham St. Anthony junior pulled away at the mile and won by 84 seconds ahead of Herrin’s Kara Martin. Keller’s 18:03 time was a course personal best. She has run on this course three times.

Keller looks like she is fully recovered from a hip injury that slowed her down during the track season. There was no slowing her down on this day. By the 2000 meter point of the race heading into the back portion of the course that is the toughest part of the course full of hills, Keller had a 10 second lead on Martin. By the time she left the woods area with a little more than 1200 meters to go, her lead had grown close to 50 seconds.

“I really did not make any surges in that back half,” Keller said after the race. “I just tried to maintain my pace.”

After the track season, Keller took time off to let herself heal. For six weeks, she basically did nothing. No running, no swimming. This race was her first major effort since coming back. “This was the longest run that I have done since I came back,” she added. “I really have not run anything longer than two miles continuously this summer.”

This season could be shorter for the junior than her 2014 campaign. She hinted after the meet that she did not want a longer season possibly not taking part in the post-season meets. “I think going longer last year kind of hurt me,” Keller said. “I might do post-season but I really don’t feel like doing it at this point.”

The Girls race was the spotlight event of this meet not only because of Keller but the expected team race between Rochester and St. Teresa. The former 1A powers have moved up into the 2A classification for the 2015 season. Rochester was moved up because of an increase of enrollment. St. Teresa was moved up because of the IHSA “Success Factor” that allows the organization the right to move a non-border school up a classification it a team has been too successful in state competition. It makes the Bulldogs the smallest 2A cross country school this fall. Most likely, these two schools will challenge each other in the Decatur Sectional at the end of October. If Saturday’s race was any indication, these two schools could be battling for a sectional championship.

“Before the start of the race, I huddled up with the team and started to speak in a serious tone,” Rochester Coach Bill Owens said. “I told them to go out and have fun. This is not a job. This is an extra-curricular activity. Have fun with it.”

The Rochester team did have fun with it winning the meet championship with 58 points. St. Teresa finished second with 79 points. Notre Dame Academy of Cape Girardeau MO, Freeburg, and Herrin rounded out the top five. Herrin ran a great team race as they had Kara Martin (2^nd), freshman Kaelan Hall (5^th), and Maura Farrell (9^th) all in the top ten.

Both Rochester and St. Teresa took the pace out conservatively. Both teams moved up in the pack over the last two miles. It was Rochester that won all five of the individual scoring battles with St. Teresa. What was somewhat of a surprise to observers is that the Rockets had two freshmen among their scoring five. Freshman Katherine Petty was Rochester’s first runner placing third finishing only five seconds by Herrin’s Martin. Madeline Campbell was the next Rockets runner in 10^th followed by Ellie Tjelmeland (13^th), freshman McKenzie Swope (17^th), and Kennedy Duffy (25^th). Rochester was without top five runner Megan McNicholas who was held out of this race. McNicholas, who was all-state as a freshman, missed all of last season due to an injury. Her first race will be in Peoria in two weeks. Rochester’s five runner split was 126 seconds.

“We wanted to run a smart race. We wanted to be conservative at the beginning,” Owens said. “We had a tight 1-5 split. It was where we needed it to be. We were without Megan McNicholas who opted for a training run. I really think it points to a good season for us.”

St. Teresa finished nicely for their first meet of the year. The first four runners ran in packs of two. Kelsey Cleary and Ashley Johnson finished 11^th & 12^th. Lauren Evelti and Ashton Jerger finished 18^th & 19^th. Pamela Tacud was the Bulldogs’ fifth runner placing 32^nd. Their overall five runner split was 86 seconds.

Salem had to wait a while after the Boys race was over to find out if they had won the team championship. The Wildcats took care of business up front throughout the race as they made their presence known. There was a sea of green in the first fifteen spots.  It was the gap between their fourth and fifth that had them on pins and needles. Their firepower up front gave them the win with 96 points.

Salem’s first three runners were within seven seconds of each other. Caden Owens was in first for Salem in 5^th followed by Hayden Wimberly (6^th), and Blake Quandt (7^th). Dawson Webster was the team’s fourth runner (11^th) with Dawson Linder as their fifth runner (68^th). Their four runner split was only 30 seconds. There was a two minute split between Webster and Linder.

“They have worked pretty hard this summer. I just wanted to see what they had today,” said Salem Coach Geff Purcell. “We got third last year. They came in here knowing who they wanted to beat. Our top four guys worked their butts off this summer. Our5-6-7 worked hard but they are not there yet. We expected our top guys to be there. Their goal was to place three in the top ten and they did that. Not getting to state last year finishing seventh in our sectional has spurred them on especially our top four. They do not want to go through what they did last year.”

Notre Dame Academy, in their first time at the meet, finished second with 107 pints. Freeburg, paced by the 4-12 finish by Charlie Parrish and Alex Mack finished next with 118 points. Mascoutah and Breese Mater Dei rounded out the top five. Nashville was two points behind Mater Dei in sixth.

Carterville’s Harrison Thomas looked like he was on a mission in this race. He had a good season last fall winning the sectional race on this course. His season was tarnished by a bad race at state when he finished 57^th. He has his sights on the top 25 in November. He started off on a good note in this race. He took the lead early on but had only a five second lead ahead of Notre Dame Academy’s Rudy McClellan.

Thomas went to work on the hills during the second mile opening up a 20 second lead when he left the back portion of the course. Thomas pulled away in the final mile to cross the line in 16:17. Rochester’s Josh Cable passed McClellan in the final 400 to place second 35 seconds behind Thomas. McClellan held off Freeburg’s Charlie Parish for third.

“I just wanted to go out there and lead by the mile and see where I could go from there,” Thomas said. “I wanted to push the hills and cruise in at the end. I just wanted to build the lead in the hills and I did.”