2026 North Carolina
Boys State 8A Qualifier (8th Place)
Girls State 8A Qualifier (6th Place)
Girls
State Champs
2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014
Boys
State Champs
2010, 2017, 2022
8A State Meet
On Saturday November 7th, 14 GHXC runners competed in the 2nd ever 8A State Championship. The race was run as usual at Ivey Redmon Park in Kernersville, but for only the 2nd time ever North Carolina schools were divided into 8 classifications instead of 4. This move from 8 championship races to 16 caused the state meet to move to 2 days rather than the traditional 1 day event. 2026 also marked the last year the course at Ivey Redmon would be run on the same configuration as it has been for the last 10 years or so, as the course route will change for 2027.
The boy’s team earned the 6th and final spot in the state meet last weekend at the East Regional, but hoped to finish in the top 5 at the state meet. All the top teams this year were in the eastern half of the state so this meet would be a glorified regional. The course at Ivey Redmon generally runs slower than most of the other popular courses in the state so times usually are not too fast. Recent course alternations, though, made the course run slightly faster than in years past. The boy’s race started at 9:35am and the team was excited to see where they stacked up. Nathan Vo went out with the leaders and hung with them for awhile as he managed a 10th place finish (15:55) to earn his 2nd cross country all-state position. The boys ran well the first half of the race, but struggled a bit later in the race to finish 8th in the team standings.
After an hour or so wait after the boy’s race, the girls team made their return to the state meet after an absence of several years. Like the boy’s race, the top teams in the state were all from the East Regional. The girls earned a 4th place finish in the East, so they hoped for a top 5 team finish at the state meet. Freshman Riley Reeves topped off her stellar rookie campaign, by going out in 3rd place and running mostly solo for the whole race and earning a bronze medal and all-state status. For being in the state meet for the first time in many years, the girls ran well. While the course creates slightly slower times, the girls ran great and raced to a 6th-place team finish. Scorers were Reeves, Izzy Short, Juliette Diaz, Kali Hansen, and Riley Blake.
It was good to have both Green Hope teams back competing at the state meet together and the season overall was a success. The seniors have a lot to be proud of, and the underclassmen hopefully got a taste of success and will be willing to put the work in to keep moving forward. Great job all.