HLV boys, English Valleys girls take second at invite

NORTH ENGLISH — Several South Iowa Cedar Conference runners descended on Knoll Ridge Country Club in North English Sept. 12 for an English Valleys-hosted cross-country meet. A strong and deep Pekin squad won both the boys and girls races.

Boys race

The HLV boys’ team had a strong showing in the meet, finishing second. Brody Sternhagen paced the Warriors with a time of 18:11 on the course that was under the typical 5K distance.

Sternhagen finished 12th overall.

Next across the line was Nolan Pirkl, in 15th, Austin VanHamme, in 17th, Payton Roth 19th, Drew Thys 24th and Ethan Licht in 42nd.

“Our runners went into the box with a variety of goals in mind. Most of those revolved around achieving personal best times. All of our runners that scored accomplished that goal,” said HLV Coach Matt Vavroch.

“Our runners have been working really hard this season and it has been very rewarding for everyone involved to see that work pay off.”

Belle Plaine finished eighth overall. English Valleys and Iowa Valley both participated but did not enter full teams.

The Plainsmen were led by Maddox Purk, who finished 22nd. He was followed by Harry Singh, Phillip Drahos, Ian Davis, Sawyer Neuhaus, and Hunter Henry.

English Valleys was represented by Jonathyn Downing and Gage Heyne.

Iowa Valley runners were Derek Bral and Elijah Pritchard.

Girls race

The English Valleys girls captured second place with an impressive showing, finishing a mere three points behind Pekin. The Bears finished with five girls in the top 20.

Addison Achenbach crossed the line first for EV, finishing sixth overall with a time of 20:40. Kaylee Frazier was ninth, Aubrey Auchenbach 11th, Kailor Lown 14th and Mallory Koehn 16th. Jaidyn Rugg capped the scoring for the Bears.

Belle Plaine and Iowa Valley girls did not start full teams.

Iowa Valley runners included Hannah Ryan, who finished 21st overall, Kathryn Kilgard, Brooklyn Kilgard, Grace Ryan, and Hannah Smolick.

Belle Plaine’s Elle Jacobi and Hailey Manley also competed in the girls competition.