Surprises were the order of the day at the Southern Invitational cross country meet Thursday at New River Park in Beckley.

Charleston Catholic dominated the girls field, defeating Greenbrier East 23-53.

“We’re a young team, even though I have a lot of seniors,” Irish coach Scott Welch said. “Ally Hoyer is our front runner. The other girls — two through nine — we’re trying to figure out who is going to be the top seven on the team. I was pleased with their effort, but we’ve got a long way to go. We’ve got to do a lot of speed work and mile repeats to get that speed up.”

Richwood captured the boys title with 39 points. The Lumberjacks won a tight three-way battle over Catholic, which finished with 49 points, and Greenbrier East, which ended with 59.

“I am pleasantly surprised,” Richwood coach Rocco Milanese said. “I knew we were going to be OK, good, but I didn’t know how good. It was a real strong performance and everybody ran hard. Our practices are going to start getting hard now.

“I’m not shocked, but I am very surprised that we won this thing.”

New Greenbrier East coach Darel Pickenpaugh was pleased with how the Spartans performed.

“I think that the race that we ran at Marietta (Saturday) helped put us into position to run like we did today,” he said. “We’ve got some kids that are working hard and put the miles in over the summer. That’s what puts you into position to do this now.”

While Catholic’s Hoyer was expected to be one of the favorites in the girls event and backed that up with a winning time of 23 minutes, 21 seconds, her Irish teammates laid waste to the remainder of the field, taking nine of the next 12 positions behind her.

Hoyer believed the hills on the course were key for her individual victory.

“It was the uphill, actually,” she said. “Every time it was close I pulled away when we were going uphill. Downhill — I guess I have a long stride — I opened my legs and moved along.”

The Greenbrier East duo of Gabby Dugan and Mary Kellan Curry grabbed second and third place to lead the Spartans’ effort.

“When I’d get to a hill, it was really bad,” Dugan said. “I knew I just had to get it on the flat part and kick it on the flat.”

Dugan, who had her freshman season cut short by illness last year, looked to be back in form, posting a time of 23:49.

“Hopefully, I don’t catch it again,” she said. “I had (mononucleosis) last year at the end of the year. It slowed my training down a lot and I didn’t get to go to states. This year, I’m going to states.”

Curry, a junior in her first season of running cross country, crossed the tape with a time of 24:47.

“What I really struggled on was the repetitive hills,” she said. “Each time I went around, the hills just seemed to get harder and harder and harder.”

Catholic’s Whitney Merrill, Brittany Hoyer, Libba Rollins, Emily Sokolosky, Emily Sherrard and Erin Lane followed in fourth through ninth place, while Woodrow Wilson’s Kayla Bryant rounded out the top 10.

East’s Brad Dugan left the boys field in his wake, winning with a time of 18:52.

“It felt good,” he said. “I went out at my own pace and pretty much ran my own race.”

Dugan took control of the event from the opening gun, taking the lead as the field climbed the first hill.

Catholic’s Tony Majestro followed in second place with a time of 19:30, just ahead of Richwood’s Derrick Chaffin, who ran a 19:38.

Chaffin had been battling a nagging injury but showed no signs of it in the event.

“I had a hurt knee coming into the race,” he said. “I didn’t feel it when I started running — adrenaline, I guess. I came out on top pretty good, so I’m happy about it.”

His Lumberjack teammate, Andrew Shaffer (19:53), placed fourth and East’s Mason Haynes (20:14) completed the top five.

Richwood’s Charles Bard, Independence’s Issac Cales, Charleston Catholic’s Andrew Blair, Richwood’s Emmet Rogers and Greenbrier East’s Josh Whitt rounded out the top 10.

— E-mail:

rjett@register-herald.com



Southern Invitational Results

at New River Park, Beckley

Girls

Team Scores: Charleston Catholic 23, Greenbrier East 53, Woodrow Wilson 76, Richwood 84. Others: Independence, Liberty, Bluefield and Shady Spring JV.

Individual Results

Ally Hoyer (CC) 23:21, Gabby Dugan (GE) 23:49, Mary Kellan Curry (GE) 24:47, Whitney Merrill (CC) 25:12, Brittany Hoyer (CC) 25:29, Libba Rollins (CC) 25:35, Emily Sokolowsky (CC) 25:51, Emily Sherrard (CC) 26:11, Erin Lane (CC) 26:24, Kayla Bryant (WW) 26:44, Cat Higgins (CC) 26:59, Emily Witsberger (CC) 27:57, Lauren DeFilippo (CC) 27:59, Mae Scott (GE) 28:12, Katie Cole (R) 28:16, Haylei Davis (WW) 28:23, Morgan Mullins (R) 29:28, Paige Hacker (R) 29:50, Michelle Oye (WW) 29:51, Chris Leacock (WW) 30:22, Mary Warner (GE) 30:41, Mary Bolsvert (GE) 31:07, Emily Lilly (I) 31:13, Emily Elmore (SS) 31:23, Tricia Gibson (SS) 31:31, Morgan Ferrell (I) 31:35, Alexis Hancock (WW) 31:41, Miranda Daniel (L) 31:44, Andrea Joseph (CC) 31:56, Amelia Shaffer (R) 32:56, Alicia Jones (SS) 34:02, Allison Farmer (L) 34:20, Caity Richmond (R) 34:43, Ashleigh Mills (I) 34:55, Monique Oye (WW) 35:10, Kayla Hazelwood (B) 35:55, Brooke Green (R) 36:43, Leslie Cook (WW) 39:34, Holli Myers (R) 40:51, Jenny Long (SS) 41:40, Haley Stower (R) 44:51, Danielle McDonald (WW) 45:02.



Boys

Team Scores: Richwood 39, Charleston Catholic 49, Greenbrier East 59, Independence 121, Woodrow Wilson 128, Shady Spring 137, Oak Hill 172, Nicholas County 178. Others: Bluefield.

Individual Results

Brad Dugan (GE) 18:52, Tony Majestro (CC) 19:30, Derrick Chaffin (R) 19:38, Andrew Shaffer (R) 19:53, Mason Haynes (GE) 20:14, Charles Bard (R) 20:22, Issac Cales (I) 20:47, Andrew Blair (CC) 21:04, Emmet Rogers (R) 21:06, Josh Whitt (GE) 21:22, Anthony Hancock (WW) 21:23, Cam Strawderman (CC) 21:29, John Daly (CC) 21:30, Alex Casingal (CC) 21:32, Scotty Treadway (OH) 21:32, Drew Sauls (WW) 21:39, Jesse Hammonds (R) 21:48, Aaron Halstead (SS) 21:50, Danial Richards (I) 21:51, Zac Larkins (GE) 21:59, Michael McKinney (SS) 22:07, Lucas Gardner (OH) 22:15, Ethan Alderson (GE) 22:26, Scotty Moore (NC) 22:28, Ethan Wood (I) 22:37, Lukas Meadows (SS) 22:38, Brian Mosteller (CC) 22:49, Marc Madiman (R) 22:51, Steven Smileck (WW) 23:08, Tyler Foster (I) 23:15, Jordan Wooldridge (WW) 23:27, Jacob Scruggs (B) 23:33, Logan Payton (NC) 23:50, Cody Arbuckle (GE) 24:17, Chad Brady (B) 24:33, Kyle Diem (GE) 24:43, Ben Nelson (SS) 24:46, Derek Tinney (R) 25:00, Nick Jermain (GE) 25:13, Nick Marsh (NC) 25:14, Andrew Wood (SS) 25:15, John Fauss (CC) 25:16, Ben Fleming (NC) 25:30, Sam Wood (I) 25:42, Michael Marcus (CC) 25:45, Eric Robbins (WW), Malcom Haynes (GE) 25:59, Zane Zeitler (I) 26:08, Gary Massey (OH) 26:19, Mike Smith (OH) 26:23, Albert Garrett (OH) 26:45, Dylan Brown (R) 26:52, Nathan Nutter (NC) 26:54, Andrew Shaw (B) 27:33, Tim Terry (R) 27:33, Scott Dietz (B) 27:43, David Dotson (GE) 28:59, Hunter Runion (SS) 29:16, Jordan Cox (NC) 31:05, Justin Watkins (I) 31:07.