SALEM — When Crothersville Coach Carl Bowman looked at the official results of the girls’ race in the Salem Invitational cross-country meet on Saturday he was amazed at what he saw.
He knew Kaylyn Holman, his freshman standout, had won the race, but he didn’t realize she ran a 21:10.
He said that is one of the fastest runs ever by a CHS girl.
“We have a conference school (Borden) here and I told her to make sure she was ahead of the conference school runners,” Bowman said. “I told her to make sure she got out, that she didn’t get boxed in, and just follow the Gator if you’re unsure (of the course).
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“I guess by the time she reached the top of the hill she was right on top of the gator. I don’t think she gets too frustrated or excited too much. She’s kind of low key on everything. Being a freshman, in her first big meet, and to be as successful on this, I think it is going to be a really big boost for her confidence.”
Bowman said Holman is the first Crothersville to ever win the Salem meet.
Ella Plasse placed 38th for the CHS girls with a time of 25:49, and Bowman said he told her to stay in front of the third Borden runner, and she ended up beating the second Borden runner, so he was pleased with that.
Silver Creek won the girls race with 35 points, Forest Park was second (54) and Brownstown Central was third (86). Crothersville and Trinity Lutheran only had two runners apiece in the girl’s race.
Austin, with individual champion Ethan Fugate leading the way at 17:06, easily won the boys team title with 29 points. Silver Creek was second with 53, and Brownstown was eighth at 191. Again, Crothersville and Trinity only had two runners each in the race.
Topping Brownstown was Kaelyn Johnson, sixth at 22:23. Next for BC were Shauna Drake, 14h at 23:46, and Claire Poulton 16th at 23:50.
“This was our fastest race of the year so far so I was definitely pleased with our top seven overall,” Braves coach Maria Conklin said. “I think everybody ran a season-best.
“The goal again for Kaelyn was top five. She ran a smart race. She kind of found her spot at the beginning and kept pushing. Hopefully at North Harrison she can get down in the 21s because she knows that course well. That should be a really good race for her.”
Topping the Trinity girls was Sadie Nay, 58th at 27:58. The Cougars’ Abby Hildreth was 69th in 30:
“We put in a good effort into the race,” Trinity coach Jennifer Hildreth said. “They’ve been training really hard. Miss Abby had a great finish today.”
This was Nay’s first race, as she recently got her 10th practice in.
For the Jackson County boys, AJ Goecker of Trinity Lutheran was sixth at 18:02, David Rose topped Crothersville in 17th at 18:43, and Mason Kellogg led Brownstown in 22nd place at 18:59.
“Going into this I really wanted to focus on times,” Brownstown coach Derrick Koch said. “We did pretty well. We had some improvement on most of the team. I’m looking for the whole team to step up and run together as a pack.
“If we can get a few guys to move up and run a little closer to Mason – we had 19 spots there to our second runner so we’ve got to get a little closer there to Mason and keep running as a pack. That will be the goal the next few weeks, to get everyone to run together.”
Trey Hackman was the Braves’ second runner, 41st at 20:29.
Bowman said Rose had a strong race.
“I think David ran well today. I think he pretty much gave everything he had,” he said. “That was not bad for Lane (Wienhorst) to get his first race out of the way. He was a little jittery. I think there was a lot of pressure on him to going into his senior year.”
Jacob Sabotin of Trinity was 75th with a time of 213:11.
“Jacob cut time for the second race in a row so he’s pretty excited about that. It’s his first year ever running cross-country,” Hildreth said. “He set a standard a few races ago and he’s been able to PR every race. I was very pleased with AJ’s effort. He was right there in that front pack and held on. He’s been working extremely hard and increasing his miles. These early meets are still training.”
Crothersville will have a home meet Tuesday, Brownstown will to go North Harrison Thursday, and Trinity will be off until a Sept. 4 meet at Scottsburg.