Gilmer High School cross-country runners saw their season come to a close.
The GHS Bobcats and Lady Cats made their way to Unicoi State Park last Wednesday for the muddy Region 7-3A Championships, and a top-four placement was needed to advance to the state meet.
The Bobcats missed qualifying by one spot and landed in fifth place with 132 points. The Lady Cats placed sixth with a score of 127.
“I thought our runners competed really hard and followed the game plan the best they could considering the conditions,” GHS coach Tommy Jones said.
“Naomi Coombs, our senior, was exactly at the spots we wanted her to be at every point of the race. It was just one of those things where the competition was so tough this year.
“The boys all ran well. Unfortunately, one of our top five runners (John Nix) dropped out of the race because of stomach issues. One of our freshman had an off-day, and that’s putting a lot of pressure on a freshman to be a top-five runner. Between those two things, that really hurt us, but I was real happy with how everyone did.”
Region 7-3A teams had to deal with sloppy conditions on a course that hosted 10 races before they got to run. Coupled with heavy rains from the night before, the course was a muddy morass by the time they started running.
“For that race, that day, it might have been the most challenging cross-country race I’ve seen in 20 years,” Jones said. “There was so much rain the day before and day of. They hosted three regions that day and we were the last to run. All the kids who were running were tearing that race to pieces. By the time we got on it, it was slop. But as I told the team, the teams who are running against us are running the same thing we’re running.”
Dawson County dominated the boys 5K as all five Tiger point scorers landed in the top 10 and clocked in at 18:00 or faster.
North Hall’s Andrew Jones blew away the field with a time of 15:34, which was 1:28 faster than second place.
Gilmer’s top runner was Carson Purvis. He placed 11th in 18:16, and teammate Dylan Byrd also cracked the top 20 in 18:44 for 19th. Bobcat John Keener was the next to cross the finish line in 29th place with a time of 19:40.
Bobcat Austin Long took 35th place in 20:17, while Michael Little finished in 38th place at 21:04. Andrew Mooney posted a time of 24:02 for 46th.
North Hall won the girls region title led by first-place finisher Caylee Wagner in 19:03. Similar to Jones, she won with room to spare and was 1:23 ahead of the runner-up.
Coombs just missed a top six placement, which was needed for an individual state qualification. She placed eighth in 22:09, and Madison Stanley was the next Gilmer runner to cross the finish line in 17th place with a time of 23:04.
The next four Lady Cats were bunched together and included Helena Garland (32nd place, 25:08), Amaila Perez (34th, 25:57), Mallory Henson (36th, 27:22) and Laney Hensley (38th, 30:51).
Behind North Hall (37 points) in the girls standings and qualifying for state were White County (50), Cherokee Bluff (56) and Dawson County (116).
Region 7-3A’s qualifying boys teams included Dawson County (35), Cherokee Bluff (56), North Hall (79) and White County (105).
“We only had three seniors this year with two boys and one girl. Looking back at it, I knew that was going to be a big deal,” Jones said.
“We started off the season so bad finishing last at our first race. But then we really did well from that point and were having good races and everyone was improving. It might look like we didn’t finish well but we really did. This is just a tough region. North Hall, White and Dawson, they are three of the best cross-country public high schools in the state.”