Only those within the Southeast family understood what was happening at the start of the boy’s varsity race today. When the lead runners came over the hill 800 meters in, the Lancer’s lead pack was nowhere to be seen. But when the boys in Carolina blue came into view, they did so as a team.  

        “We’ve got three boys who are flirting with personal bests, and they are going to be incredibly important pieces for the team come Regionals. To help them out, we decided to pack race today,” Coach Julie Jones said. 

        The idea was to pace Henry Burns, Michael Smith, and Kayden Utley through a 7:30 mile pace. Hudson Locke lead them through at exactly that in the first mile, with Tucker Sutton, Chris Archey, and Zayne Gabern encouraging their teammates to keep pushing. 

        It’s not easy to sit back and tempo run when an athlete knows they can get a medal, but the sacrifice that Locke, Archey, Gabern, and Sutton made for their teammates was worth it. 

        Burns finished in a season best of 23:09 and finished 36th. The junior cut off 30 seconds from his best time this season, and it was a three minute improvement from this same race last year. Smith finished 44th in a time of 24:27, an improved time from last week’s home meet, which was only four days ago. Utley was unable to finish but had been on pace to break 22 minutes.

        “I appreciate what our top four did for their teammates. I couldn’t be happier with how it worked out for Henry. He’s ahead of where he was at this time last season, and that’s exciting for what he can do with four more weeks of training,” Jones said. “Utley is still figuring it out, but he’ll get there. He could be a really strong fifth for us. Michael has such a strong finish. Then, we get Ryan [Sossman] back next week, and it makes things really competitive for us as a team and for those final three varsity spots.”

        On the girls side, Jackie Robinson and Journee Rimmer finished in the top 10, earning them each a medal. Robinson finished 6th with a time of 25:25. Rimmer finished just behind her in 7th with a time of 25:45. The junior’s time is only two seconds slower than her season best. 

        “I had a goal of getting in the 25’s, and I made it. I’ve been struggling with health problems at the start of the season, now more mentally than physically. But I was able to pass people, run a good race, and get a faster time than last week,” Rimmer said. 

       Jones was happy with how the two juniors ran without their lead runner, Kendyl Renn.

       “Our senior leader [Renn] was out today, so that was a big change for our two juniors. They handled themselves perfectly in the race. Both girls made strong moves just after the mile mark that set them up perfectly for a medal finish. We will race a full team next week, and I’m excited to see what we do against some good competition,” Jones said. 

📸 by Julie Jones