The Southeast Valley cross country teams opened up their 2024 season with the annual Southeast Valley Invite in Gowrie on Thursday, August 29^th. Weather played a role in this year’s invite as a hot and sunny day, turned to a cloudy, breezy and thankfully slightly cooler meet, but still humid as storms threatened to postpone the meet. However, both the boys and girls were able to finish the 5k race just as the storms rolled in.

               In the boys’ race, class 1A ranked ACGC won the meet with 72 points followed by St. Edmond with 83 and Fort Dodge Senior High with 114. Host Southeast Valley finished 10^th with 247 points. In the girls’ race, #1 ranked class 1A Madrid won the meet with 41 points, while St. Edmond claimed second with 74 and ACGC with 88. The Jaguar girls finished 9^th with 244 points.

               A trio of junior boys led the Jaguars with course PRs. Lincoln Akins was the top finisher for Southeast Valley crossing the finish line in 21:23 for 41^st place and was followed right behind by Ethan Tucker who ran 21:27 for 42^nd. Drew Dorsey’s 21:43 wasn’t far behind as he finished 46^th. Owen Nuss (59^th, 22:38) and Grant Farnham (74^th, 24:15), running his first high school cross country meet as a senior, rounded out the scoring five for the Jaguars.

               Sophomore Evan Kuhn was the only returner that ran a career PR in his first race of the season. Evan ran 26:22 which was 45 seconds faster than his best time last year. Also competing Thursday in the boys’ race was Caden Kaltschnee (81^st, 24:48), Carver Peterson (84^th, 24:51), Logan Bintz (86^th, 25:10), Oliver Riehl (106^th, 26:51), Carter Ganoe (107^th, 26:52), Kayden Showers (108^th, 27:05) and Ben Wanat (124^th, 29:17).

               The top finisher for the girls’ team was Katie Field. Katie finished 42^nd for a course PR of 26:22. Sophomore Meia Hefley competing in her first cross country meet ever was the second Jag across the finish line in 29:35, finishing 64^th. Autumn Jones-Popp (67^th, 30:10), Brooke Peterson (68^th, 30:18) and Hailey Rees (73^rd, 30:57) joined Katie and Meia as the five scorers in the meet. Amelia Christensen (80^th, 36:37) and Abbi Tucker (81^st, 36:55) competed in the girls race for the Jaguars as well.

               The cross-country teams will compete in Webster City on Tuesday, September 3^rd before heading to Greene County Middle School in Jefferson on Thursday, September 12^th.