Putting the first league meet behind us, Corona performed at a much higher level for the 2nd Big VIII League Meet at Mountain Gate Park! The JV Girls and Varsity boys raced to victories while our JV Boys and Varsity Girls raced to close, competitive 2nd place finishes. ML King, once again, has taken our league to another level as this is the most competitive league Corona has ever been in. With their girls being ranked Top 10 in the state and their boys being the most improved team in the county, it has made us earn every point we get here in 2008!
Starting off with the girls JV race, Aubrey LeAnce went up "the hill" in 3rd place and emerged in 1st place coming back down. She motored to her first victory ever to lead seven Corona girls in the top 9 for the easy victory! Christina Ledesma continues to battle her way back with a strong 3rd place finish and was followed closely by Nathalie Aguilar. Reyna Gutierrez ran her best race of the season while Tania Merida paced the team for the first two miles of the race for a 7th place finish. Isabel Cruz put together her best race to date as well. We took 2nd place at the first league meet, but finished strong with a nice 21-44 victory here! But, do not be fooled - ML King had two of their top six out today and that effected their JV line-up. They will come back much stronger in three weeks at the league finals...
In the boys JV race, an injured Garrett Williams to go along with a sick Logan Shryock was too much to overcome a very deep King squad. In what became a dual meet (top 16 were King and Corona), King placed six in the top nine and cemented the 22-36 victory. To show how much it was a two team race, the 3rd place team had 109 points. Fernando Cerda cruised to a nice victory while Antonio Garcia ran one of his best races of the year. We had some "off" races from several others but truly believe that our boys will rebound in three weeks at league finals to share the league title.
The varsity girls had the toughest task of the day - take on one of the best teams in the state! Well, we truly commend our girls for running their strongest race of the season and "going after it!" Haley Brzycki placed a strong 3rd place while she was followed by an improving Ashley Evans. Malaysia Alexander ran her best race in a month and looked more confident, especially after her last 200 meters! Speaking of kicks, Desirae Santana put on a show the last 100 meters, blowing by two girls. Despite twisting her ankle with 300 meters, Lauren Cochran closed out our scoring with a solid effort. Sitting out their #1, King was able to get us 29-37. But, by far - this was our best race of the season as our girls ran a solid 97:18 team time on a good course!
Our varsity boys took a hit the first time around with a 1-point loss to ML King, but they came through in fine style with a 13 point (37-50) victory this time around. Michael Gauger was barely outkicked by King's #1 for first place, but our trio of Patrick Mynes, Alan Cuevas and Chase Williams brought it home with 6th, 7th and 8th place finishes. Considering how these boys are still "training through" these meets and running them on tired legs, these were very impressive performances. Franklin Sloat closed the door with his 14th place finish while outkicking King's #5. Their 79:32 was a pretty impressive team time as King's 80:40 goes to show you how competitive they have become. Finally, Jimmy Gauger ran an awesome race with his 17th place finish in his first varsity race!
