PIAA District 3 Championship
Wyomissing won. The girls, for an incredible 4th straight time. They are the Harrier #14 team in the US, and they showed it, placing five in the top eight, and all seven in the top 13 for an incredible 20 points. The spread, a mere 1:13. The boys' squad from Wyo also won, by a comfortable 67 points. This is a program that is on top and in position to stay there. Amy Huss took the individual title in 19:20. Debbie was just five seconds back (Above @ 700 meters). Lancaster Mennonite soph Kristen Groff broke up a clean sweep of the Wyo top four by getting 3rd in 19:30. Ryan Blood, the East Pennsboro senior, is in the shape of his life, and ran the fastest time of the day in 16:22 on a very muddy, very slow course. More impressively, he led from 300 meters on and basically coasted the last mile. Little sister Kari did one-up him though, getting 6th in the AAA race, better than her big bro did as a frosh. Red Lion's Kate Papenberg "had a lot of fun" in the mud and ran a powerful 19:04 to win the girls' AAA race, pulling away from Lampeter-Strasburg senior Emily Kruger nearing the two mile. Governor Mifflin took the district title behind the 14th place finish of Demetria Koutsaurais. Cumberland Valley junior Brian Fuller pulled away over the final half mile to win AAA boys in 16:32, five seconds up on super frosh Craig Miller. Cedar Cliff defended their District title behind the come-from-behind 3rd place finish of senior Patrick Phibin in 16:39. Red Lion was the 5th and final team to qualify for AAA boys after a timing snafu temporarily gave the last slot to Cumberland Valley. CV coach Steve Koons accepted the change with anticipated class. And Reading junior Ramon Lopez was added to the qualifier list after most had left the meet.