With a month left in the cross country season, the finish line is coming into sight for locals.
Big meet after big meet have come and gone of late and the large Dave Sanders Invitational races Sept. 26 at Clement Park provided the best of the Aurora area boys and girls a chance to shine.
The Cherokee Trail boys won the Division I team championship, while two area individuals finished in the top two in each race as preparation for the final stretch of the season continues to build.
The area girls ranks have been strengthened by the addition of two outstanding freshmen in McKenna Groen of Regis Jesuit and Madison Lange of Cherokee Trail, former club teammates who were both in the Dave Sanders DI girls field.
In warm conditions she said she favors — at least when she’s running cross country, Groen claimed second place with a time of 18 minutes, 14 seconds, which put her only behind Claire Guiberson of Mountain Vista (17:31.80) among the 210 individuals from 24 scoring programs who crossed the finish line.
“I knew Claire would go out because I’ve raced her before, but I ran with Maddie (Lange) a lot last season, so I knew I could stay with her most of the race and that’s what I did,” Groen said.
It was the latest stellar performance for Groen, who placed third at the Cheyenne Mountain Stampede on the state meet course at the Norris Penrose Event Center in her first varsity race. She went out with the leaders at the Liberty Bell Invitational and set the program record with a 17:28.50, though she faded a bit and finished 10th in the Sweepstakes race. It has been a learning process.
“I still have a few more races to test out some tactics to see which ones will work before state,” she said.
Lange has made a splash of her own, as she won the Aurora City Championship meet in her first varsity race — which she won by nearly a full minute — and she also claimed the St. Vrain Invitatioanl with a time of 18:22.77. At the Liberty Bell, Lange finished fourth (with only Heritage star Emery Schwalm, Eaton’s Delaney Reuter and Guiberson in front of her) in 16:58.20.
An 18:33.1 at the Dave Sanders meet put Lange comfortably in fourth place. She has joined a team that has experience, especially from juniors Jade McDaniel and Clara Kapfer, who have had their share of highlights this season and finished 2-3 behind Lange at the Aurora City Championships.
Groen and Lange may see each other again in the closing weeks of the season, but definitely will (barring injury) on Oct. 23 at the Aurora Sports Park as Cherokee Trail and Regis Jesuit are both in the field of the Class 5A Region 1 meet, where they will try to lead their respective squads to state meet berths.
The Cherokee Trail boys program is now under the direction of Jonathan Dalby, who won a slew of state championships with the Mountain Vista boys program before he came over during the summer. Dalby assumed command of a program that finished a successful run under Chris Faust.
The Cougars are led by senior Dylan Smith, a key contributor to the Cherokee Trail boys track & field team’s third straight 5A state championship in the spring and winner of the Aurora City Championship race to open the season. Smith paced the team at the Dave Sanders meet as well with a fourth-place finish.
“We knew there were a few teams from our region that were at Dave Sanders and if we could match up well with them it would put us in good position,” Dalby said. “We gave the boys a stretch goal to try to win it and fortunately they were able to do it. …Both our boys and girls teams have made awesome progress since we started.”
Individually, Vista PEAK Prep junior Brandon Pearcy shined at the Dave Sanders as he finished as the runner-up behind Golden’s Jackson Ferguson. Pearcy ran a season-best 15:57.5.
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at sports@sentinelcolorado.com. Twitter/X: @aurorasports. IG: Sentinel Prep Sports
