News: Green Hope runners impress at Friday Night Lights
2015
The Falcons drove west on I-40 to Kernersville Friday afternoon for the inaugural Friday Night Lights Invitational at Ivey Redmon Park. Not only did the Falcons head to Ivey Redmon for the race, but the park is also the site of the state meet course. The meet gave the Falcons a chance to run the new course configuration. While the new course ran much slower than the course used the last few years, the Falcons managed to have a very impressive evening of running.
The first race of the day was the JV girls race. Lindsey Eastwood (5th) led a group of 4 sophomres for GH just behind the lead pack. She was followed by Jordyn Parks (6th), Allie Haddon (9th), and Cassandra Melax (19th). Many of the girls were a little down when they saw their times, but it became clear that it was simply a slower course than the others we normally run on. The girls finished 2nd behind Apex.
Heading into the JV boys race, the Falcons had expectations of having a large pack of runners near the front of the race and they did not disappoint with 9 of the 1st 10 finishers. Senior Kenny Derek (1st) went under 18:00 for the 1st time and senior Jayquan Williams finished 2nd in his first cross country race in 2 years. Matthew Spivey (4th), Reed Blackman (5th), Ryan Tsolis (6th), Srikar Chedalavada (7th), Ryan Kemper (8th), Ryan Wagner (9th), and Andy Dawson (10th) rounded out the top 10 as the boys dominated the field with a low score of 18 points.
The 3rd race of the night was the invitational girls team. The invitational races feature the top runners from teams considered slightly behind the teams in the championship race as well as ‘B’ teams from the deeper schools. It was unclear early on which team would win the team competition, but the GH girls battled and pulled out the victory over the field. The squad was led by sophomore Lauren McLaughlin (3rd), senior Brianne Vasarhelyi (4th), freshman Emma Benson (15th), freshman Morgan Peele (18th), and senior Julia Zwierzynski (20th).
The boys had their sights set on another victory in the invitational race and by race time the sun had set and temperatures had dropped a bit. Runners started to get the experience of racing under the lights. Sophomre Daniel Vo paced the Falcons (3rd) and was followed by freshman Alex Huml (5th) who came on strong the 2nd half of the race. Seniors Michael Kolor (6th), Owen Dreikosen (7th), and Bryce Korabik (11th) rounded out the scoring as the boys cruised to the win with another very low team score of 32 points.
The main races of the day were the championship races with the girls race going off at 8:30pm. Many predicted the girls would be pushed by a strong Leesville Road team and that was the case. The Falcons managed to hold off the Pride by a score of 39-52 and bring the night’s 4th title home for the Falcons. Senior Elly Henes (3rd), freshman Alessandra Rodriguez (6th), senior Morgan Adams (8th), junior Sarah Taylor (11th), and junior Samantha Kolor (16th) were the scorers for the Falcons.
The final race of the day was the boys championship and favorite Mt. Tabor decided to treat the race more as a workout than an all-out race which meant the Falcons would compete with East Chapel Hill and Apex for the team title. It was clear from the start that the boys were in good position and really fighting, but ECH and Apex each had a couple runners near the front. When the results were announced, though, the Falcons managed to take the hard fought team title and bring home the Falcons 5th win of the night in 6 races (with a runner-up finish). Senior Henry Pehr (8) was joined by scorers sophomore Finn McBride (12th), sophomore Peyton Barish (16th), sophomore Ian Delgado (23rd), and junior Nick Veilleux (27th).
Overall it was a very good day for the Falcons. The depth of the program was apparent, as the team’s top runners won both varsity races, the team’s second group of runners won the invitational races against many team’s top 7, and the JV teams took 1st (boys) and 2nd (girls) in their races. While times were not what the runners had hoped for, the runners showed a lot of fight and should be excited for what lies ahead.
The boys race next Saturday at Wake Med Soccer Park in the Adidas/Wolfpack Invitational, while the girls race on the 26th at Hagan Stone Park in the Greensboro Invitational.