Corona Sweeps Santiago
In grand fashion, all four of our squads stepped it up and swept Santiago at Butterfield Park! Santiago was our biggest threat to the league title and basically, we have secured four more league titles here in 2007. Beware though - last year, our boys beat Santiago 24-32 in the dual meet but lost by three points at the league finals, thus, we had to share the league title. And, it's not official (as we have to still beat Roosevelt and Norco), but it would seem that our girls have claimed a part of their 7th consecutive league title while our boys will have a share of the title for the 6th time in seven seasons! Presently speaking, our athletes confirmed that they have no plans on sharing any league titles here in 2007.
Malaysia Alexander, Natalia Richeri and Brieanna Pantele were told to take the pace out hard and take Santiago's #4 and #5 girls, mentally, out of the race! They did a supurb job in doing so and took on the awesome Santiago sophomore Benson twins (Jasmine and Jordan). Malaysia ran a great race as she held off the twins the entire race and actually pulled away from them for an impressive 19 second victory! Natalia and Brieanna were right there to take 4th and 5th, ahead of Santiago's #3. Meanwhile, mission accomplished by those three as Jossie Munoz, Christina Ledesma and Reyna Gutierrez all finished ahead of Santiago's #4. Lauren Cochran, officially on the JV team today, ran a great race and finished ahead of Santiago's #5. Her smooth and steady pace is impressive to watch. All in all, we walked away with a 25-32 victory. Our girls have not lost a league dual meet since 2000. Our freshmen were only in 1st grade when that took place! Speaking of the Junior Varsity girls, supporting Lauren were Alexxis Martin (2nd), Katie Anderson (3rd), Corinna Gutierrez (4th) and Amanda Grooters (6th). Our JV girls basically raced to their 5th consecutive league title with an easy 16-45 victory!
Moving over to our boys, we knew that Santiago would give us a strong race. With an effort slightly down a notch from last Saturday, the varsity boys raced to a 25-32 victory as well! The boys have now not lost a league dual meet since 2004 (to Santiago). The race strategy was to put our top four boys on Santiago's #2. Well, the plan did not quite go as discussed, but in the end - we did put three boys ahead of Santiago's #2. Raul comfortably cruised to a 2nd place finish as it was agreed upon that he would wait until more important races down the road to seek personal goals. Meanwhile, what has become pretty common, Michael Gauger (3rd) and Alan Cuevas (4th) ran solid races as well. Patrick Mynes was a little off of his game on this day but closed well to finish ahead of their #4 while Franklin Sloat closed out our scoring. We actually put eight boys (one was Josh Verdone from the varsity race) in front of Santiago's #5, which was nice to see. Oh yeah, five of our top six were underclassmen today. Finally, our Junior Varsity boys look like they've earned another league title (4th in a row) as well. Led by Verdone (injured the past two weeks), Joey Casim, Freddy Palomares and Logan Shryock (definately fighting some illness), they walked away with an incredible 15-49 victory! Yes - that was the score as the top six finishers on the JV level were all from Corona! Last year, we took #1-#8 at league finals and we would love to match that same effort again in 2007!
To view some incredible pictures from this meet (taken by Lorena Beck), please visit... http://coachbecksactionphotos.smugmug.com/gallery/3588117
Coach Gardner is so proud of the overall determination and hard work put out by all Corona athletes! It is so rewarding to see young men and women set their minds on a goal and than sit back to watch them do what they set out to do! Let's keep this energy up folks as, in this sport, we're judged by how we finish the season! League finals is four weeks from now and than on to CIF in November!!! We've acheived our first goal; now let's go out there on Saturday and simply have some fun and race fast! Boys' times are listed below while we're still working to clarify all of the girls' times.
This Saturday - all athletes will meet at the high school at 5:55 am. We leave at 6:05 am. Our first race is at 7:45 am (sophomore boys) so we have to be there by 6:45 am! We are at Guasti Park in Ontario (map linked below). There is a $7 fee to park your vehicle. Please try to carpool if possible. Our Team Dinner will be on Friday night at the Alexander's.
Please go to www.eteamz.com/inlandempirechallenge for more information.
TOP 20 BOYS' TIMES
Raul Arcos - 16:23
Michael Gauger - 16:32
Alan Cuevas - 16:34
Patrick Mynes - 17:07
Franklin Sloat - 17:21
Chase Williams - 17:33
Josh Verdone - 17:47 (JV #1)
Joey Casim - 17:48 (JV #2)
Fernando Cerda - 18:05
Freddy Palomares - 18:??? (JV #3)
Logan Shryock - 19:05
Ulises Banos - 19:32
Robert Fitch - 19:41
Ray Jhala - 19:56
Michael Sveinson - 20:03
Antonio Garcia - 20:48
Luis Santander - 21:01
Angel Pineda - 21:08
Alonso Leyva - 21:19
Julian Semaan - 21:19
TOP 10 GIRLS' TIMES
Malaysia Alexander - 19:39
Natalia Richeri - 20:22
Brieanna Pantele - 20:29
Jossie Munoz - 20:52
Christina Ledesma - 21:09
Reyna Gutierrez - 21:16
Lauren Cochran - 21:30 (JV #1)
Tiffany Akaniro -
Alexxis Martin -
Katie Anderson -
Corinna Gutierrez -
Amanda Grooters -
April Lawson -
