By Mike Maltais
“Three teams, three trophies,” was coach Craig Herlihy’s succinct summary of Liberty Bell Junior-Senior High School’s cross-country team performance at the Kettle Falls Can-Am Invitational last Saturday (Oct. 4).
The Mountain Lions varsity boys, junior high boys and junior high girls each ran away with third-place trophies in competition among 19 schools and 15 junior high schools that included two 5A, one 2A, six 1A, and 10 B schools.
Coeur D’Alene, one of the 5A entries, gave up its first-place boys and girls awards for the smaller schools competing, “a great display of sportsmanship,” Herlihy said.
“This was our first 5-kilometer [3.1 mile] race distance of the season for the high school team,” the coach noted. “Other teams around the state should now take notice of LBHS as our results/times from this race make us one of top five fastest teams in the state [1B/2B] right now.”
Herlihy singled out the individual efforts of Ben Klemmeck, who placed third “in a tough field.”
The Can-Am gave Klemmeck a chance to test the merits of two of the state’s top B runners, Duncan Forsman of Republic and St. George’s Nathan Vanos, who sandwiched the Mountain Lion between respective second- and fourth-place finishes in the 5K.
It was also Josiah Klemmeck’s best race of the season, with his 5:44-per-mile pace and 17:47 time.
Willy Duguay, Eli Nielsen, Garett Palm and Emmett Fink “continue to work together as teammates and pull each other along to faster times,” the coach said. “Trent [Skelton] also dropped his average pace per mile down under 7 minutes for the first time this season with a 6:53 performance with a time of 21:22.”
As they have done in every race this year, Novie McCabe and Gretta Scholz continued their dominance among junior high girls with respective one-two finishes in the 1.5-mile event.
The XC varsity was scheduled to compete at Chelan on Tuesday (Oct. 7), while the junior high team was wrapping up its season at Omak the same day. The varsity team will travel to the Leavenworth Invitational on Saturday (Oct. 11).
Varsity boys results (5,000m)
3 Ben Klemmeck, 17:06
14 Josiah Klemmeck, 17:47.14
34 Willy Duguay, 18:43
41 Eli Nielsen, 18:46
56 Garett Palm, 19:30
61 Emmett Fink, 19:44
74 Carter Dornfeld, 20:43
JH girls results (1.5 mi)
1 Novie McCabe, 10:32
2 Gretta Scholz, 11:04
23 Icel Sukovaty, 12:57
33 Sage Borgias, 13:53
59 Larkin Lucy, 15:17
JH boys results (1.5 mi)
3 Emerson Worrell, 10:36
4 Walker Hall, 10:38
8 Logan Hall, 11:03
42 Zach Strong, 12:50.05
48 Ian Dornfeld, 13:16
JV boys results (1.5 mi)
47 Trent Skelton, 21:22.08
Combined girls results (5,000m)
65 Koharu Yonebayashi, 24:39
100 Mackenzie Woodworth, 31:13
Team scores — varsity boys
1 Deer Park, 57
2 West Valley — Spokane, 87
3 Liberty Bell, 143
5 Chelan, 152
6 Post Falls, 157
7 St. George’s, 198
8 Coeur d’Alene Charter, 224
9 Colville, 231
10 Freeman, 253
11 Tonasket, 271
12 Chewelah, 309
13 Lake Roosevelt, 359
14 Oroville, 408
Team scores — JH Boys
1 Colville, 64
2 Omak, 77
3 Liberty Bell, 88
4 Republic, 91
5 Deer Park, 111
6 Lakeside (Nine Mile), 132
7 Springdale, 144
8 Newport, 158
Team scores — JH Girls
1 Lakeside (Nine Mile Falls), 52
2 Colville, 67
3 Liberty Bell, 85
4 Deer Park, 92
5 Newport, 119
6 Omak, 121
7 Jenkins, 136
