Whitney Lindsey and Taylor Biaggi ran to first-place finishes in their respective races for the Douglas High cross country team at its own all-classes invitational held on Friday at Lampe Park.
Lindsey won the senior girls division race in a time of 15 minutes, 33 seconds on the flat and fast 2.5-mile course, while Biaggi ran 16:25 to win her junior race, a highlight for the Tigers.
It was a successful season opener, according to Douglas coach Keith Cole.
"Overall, I thought that it was a very solid start to the season," Cole said. "This is a unique format for a race (with the classes running as a group), and so it can be challenging to see how a team as a whole fills out.
"Our kids looked good. Whitney and Taylor each won their class races with solid times that were faster than last years marks," he added
On the boys side, Derrik Jenkins and Seth White placed third and fifth respectively in the senior race. Jenkins ran 14:16, just a few strides ahead of White in 14:20. That result came as no surprise to Cole, who pointed out the two consistently run close together in workouts.
"Derrik was really smokin' out there today. He and Seth have been really pushing each other in practice for the last few weeks, and it is great to see that hard work paying off on the course," the coach said.
Meanwhile, Corey Trujillo took fourth in the junior race with a time of 14:58. David Williams finished 12th in the senior race in 15:11 - the top four Tigers all finished within one minute of each other - and Scott Lococo ran 15:46 in the sophomore race. Other performances by the boys included Cole Sonneman (17:46) in the freshman race and Troy Shields (17:27) in the senior race.
"We have the makings of a really solid boys team that could really surprise some people this year," Cole said. "As I keep telling the boys, they need to keep packing together and running hard in practice to prepare them to race and possibly beat schools like Carson, North Valleys and perhaps South Tahoe."
Other girls who competed included Cassie Hood (18:40) and Sarah Allen (18:47) in the senior race, Amanda Boyd (19:27) and Natasha Brown (20:56) in the junior race and Amber Emerson (20:39) in the sophomore race.
"We had strong performances from Sarah Allen and Cassie Hood at the race today," Cole said. "They have been working to close that gap between themselves and Taylor - a very difficult task because Taylor is so fast. But our team is only going to be as good as our third, fourth and fifth place runners and how well they pack together on the course. I think that they are starting solid and running very well at this point in the season," Cole said.
