Goddard, KS — 9/22/22 Goddard XC Invitational Lake Afton On September 22, 2022 Goddard Cross Country competed in their 4th meet of the 2022 season at our home course Lake Afton! Monday and Tuesday this week was brutally hot with temperatures approaching 100 degrees Fahrenheit. To combat the heat the Lions ran early in the morning. Wednesday before our meet it was still a stifling 97 degrees outside as we walked the course in preparation for Thursday. As we prepared this week we kept seeing the forecast for Thursday with much excitement and boy did it turn out to be a gorgeous day! It started out as a rainy/cold day, but the rain passed providing us with the perfect day to race and the Lions raced their hearts out at Lake Afton! There are so many highlights/stories to point out so here we go! Our Boys Varsity team took 3rd place overall! 12/20 Runners ran their personal best race time in the 5K! 5 Runners ran their best race of the season inching closer and closer to their personal record! 2 Runners competed in their first 5K of the season! 2 Runners Medaled at this meet! Many of our runners ran from 30 seconds to minutes faster than their previous personal record! Girls JV 5K The girls JV 5K saw two of our runners Hope Gettings and Bo Xaysana compete in their first 5K of the season! The girls did a tremendous job and will look to improve on that race time! 13th - Hope Gettings - 26:27 37th - Bo Xaysana - 33:23 Boys JV 5K Our JV Boys team took 5th place overall, had 5 runners run personal records, and two runners run their best race of the season! 22nd - Cooper Hudson - 21:34 PR (46 seconds faster than previous PR) 26th - James Alexander - 21:45 PR (1 minute faster than previous PR) 28th - Conner Huddleston - 21:53 (Best race this season) 29th - Brendan Martling - 21:56 PR (23 seconds faster than previous PR) 42nd - Cohen Fyfe - 22:55 PR (1 minute and 26 faster than previous PR) 59th - Adam Vincent - 25:12 PR (55 Seconds faster than previous PR) 60th - Owen Granados - 25:37 (Best race this season) 65th - Cole Bennington - 27:09 Girls Varsity 5K Our Varsity Girls team saw Emma Deck and Elena Latorre compete at a very high level! These two girls ran their tales off and both of them ran personal records! Emma Deck took 12th place overall, medaled, and beat her previous PR by 1 minute and 13 seconds! Elena shattered her PR and beat it by 2 minutes and 46 seconds! 12th - Emma Deck - 23:04 PR/Medaled (1 minute and 13 seconds faster) 32nd - Elena Latorre - 24:21 PR (2 minutes and 46 seconds faster) Boys Varsity 5K Our Varsity Boys team took 3rd place overall! We saw 5 of our runners runs personal records and 3 of our runners ran their best race of the season! Luke Griffith took 3rd place overall at this meet and medaled! 3rd - Luke Griffith - 17:56 PR (Medaled/32 Seconds faster than previous PR) 16th - Nathan Harkman - 18:56 PR (38 Seconds faster than previous PR) 22nd - Nathan Lewis - 19:14 PR (23 Seconds faster than previous PR) 30th - Ayden Smith - 19:36 (Best race this season. Getting closer to PR from last season) 47th - Hudson Donaghue - 20:34 (Best race this season. Getting Closer to PR from last season) 55th - Mason Lott - 20:59 PR Coming off of a tough meet last week at Buhler we were unsure if Mason would be able to race today. He told me he felt fine and went out and ran a PR! Mason beat his PR by 10 seconds! A highlight for one of our seniors! 59th - John Esparza - 21:08 (Best race this season. Getting closer to PR) It was a truly special race for our team! The Lions will look to improve on these race times at our next race in Halstead next week. We have 2 more meets before we race in our League meet, regionals, and hopefully state meet if we can get some runners to qualify! I will be sending out league, regional, and state information next week hopefully once I get our regional assignments and more information on League. Lions Afton was high point for us this season, but we must keep trending upward! There is much to still be had this season! Stay hungry! GO LIONS! Coach Andrews/Coach Ford