Photo by Paul Trende
It does not happen too often that a cross-country team has the individual male and female champion at a meet. That type of thing has become common place this year for Lewiston-Altura/Rushford-Peterson/Houston. Matt Kingsbury has had a lot very good guy runners over the years, but with the emergence of gal Caitlin Bauer, they have been sweeping first places for both sexes. The St. Charles Meet was no different. Featuring 10 full guys and girls teams, including LFC, Chatfield, Kingsland, and GMLOS, LARPH’s guys (56) took second overall to Class AA Stewartville (37). W-K (93), the Burros (123), D-E (137), Lake City (149), the Gophers (188), St. Charles (195), PEM (219), and GMLOS (280) followed. LARPH senior Brennan Kunst won his third straight race (16:31.7), topping W-K’s Griffin Riesgraf (16:59.8) and Stewartville’s Nolan Schatz (17:00.1). Kunst was essentially running roughly five-minute, 30-second miles (at the 5,000-meter event). Teammate Grayson Speltz (17:13) took fourth while Will Jewison took 12th (17:51.3), Cole Timm 17th (18:05.8), and Henry Meyer 26th (18:42.3) to round out the team scorers. Cory Kotsmith took 27th (18:53.9) but did not score for LARPH team. LFC was paced by Andy Brown (17:49.1) in 11th place. Quinn Lepper took 19th (18:12.4), Riley Grant 29th (19:20), and Cooper Pickett 30th (19:24.7). Ben Peeters (18:03.4) took 16th to lead Chatfield while Max Hoover (19:14.6) took 28th. GMLOS did not have anyone in the top 30 (of 74 total runners). On the gals’ side, Stewartville (58) topped LFC (75), LARPH (101) and Chatfield (108) atop the team-board. D-E (116), W-K (131), St. Charles (189), GMLOS (198), LC/H (220), and Lake City (236) followed. LC/H had a couple top runners not compete (Hope Docan-Morgan and Maya Bartosova). Averaging roughly a 6:14 mile, LARPH’s Bauer (18:43.5) topped nearest foe, defending 1A champ, Autumn Rakosnik of LFC (20:12.8) for first place. A year ago, at sections, Rakosnik ran 19:06.6 while Bauer ran 20:11.3 to take ninth place. Emily Helgemoe (21:17) took sixth to give LARPH two in the top 10. Chatfield also had three in the top 15, as 7th grader Henley Johnson took 8th (21.30.5), senior Lexi Kivimagi tenth (21:40.5), and Adeline Schild 15th (22:23.8). After Rakosnik for LFC, Grace Kingsley (22:13.7) took 13th, Olivia Rindels 21st (22:55.8), Charity Kingsley 23rd (23:01.9), and Eliza Cullen 24th (23:01.9) to all make the top 25. GMLOS’ top runner was Audrey Main (22.30.3) in 19th place (of 74 runners). Both 5,000-meter races took place at St. Charles Golf Course.
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