LOWER LAKE — Despite improving their times across the board from their last appearance on the 2.9-mile Six Sigma Ranch and Winery cross country course, the Middletown High School boys dropped a hard-fought 26-29 decision to the St. Helena Saints in Coastal Mountain Conference action on Wednesday afternoon.
Fort Bragg also attended the meet as did a handful of PUC runners.
Middletown’s girls were unable to field a complete team (at least five runners) for the first time in a long, long time or they would have easily beaten Fort Bragg, which had the only complete team.
Boys
“We were disappointed that we lost the meet, but our runners were all positive and excited about what they accomplished,” Middletown head coach Taylor Tiraterra said. “All of our guys ran way below the times they had two weeks ago (at Six Sigma). We’re talking five, seven, 10 minutes better than the last time we ran here.”
St. Helena’s Cleo McClain, a junior, dominated the boys field with a time of 16:42, 24 seconds faster than his winning time a week on the same course (17:06). Well behind him in second place was Colin Russ of PUC at 18:12. Diego Sanchez of St. Helena was next at 18:33.
Middletown runners claimed four of the next six spots beginning with Xander Romero (18:44) in fourth, Parker Boden (19:28) in fifth, Evan Macklin (20:22) in seventh, and Baron Chang (21:10) in ninth.
Other top-10 finishers were Fort Bragg’s Chris Island, sixth in 19:30; St. Helena’s Justice Penterman, eighth in 20:54; and St Helena’s Hugo Chavez, 10th in 21:13.
Middletown also claimed 12th through 15th place – Javi Perez (22:24), Bryton Caviness (22:57), Dean McComas (23:14) and Caden Gotz (24:17).
Romero, a Middletown veteran, was making his fall season debut.
“It wasn’t a victory but I guess you could call it a moral victory with the way we improved our times,” Tiraterra said.
Girls
Without a fifth runner, a solid effort by Nicole Pyzer, Maya Leonard and sisters Cat and Issy Barriga didn’t lead to a Middletown team win.
“We had a runner who couldn’t make it for reasons completely beyond her control,” Tiraterra said. “But she will be back with us.”
Middletown landed four runners in the top five, with race winner Pyzer (23:12) leading the way. Fort Bragg’s Margie Martin was next at 23:36 followed by Leonard (23:56), Cat Barriga (24:21) and Issy Barriga (26:27).
Other than runner-up Martin, Fort Bragg runners finished ninth, 11th, 12th, 13th and 14th in the field.
“If we have our fifth runner we win,” Tiraterra said.
Melina Rubio led St. Helena with a sixth-place finish of 28:02. The Saints, like the Mustangs, had only four runners.
“We have a great girls team,” Tiraterra said. “We just need to make sure we have five runners.”
Schedule
Middletown and Willits travel to the Highland Springs Reservoir course, home of the Clear Lake Cardinals, next Wednesday at 3:30 p.m.
