Colby girls, C/A boys both take third in Pittsville meet
By Nathaniel Underwood
The Colby girls and Colby/Abby boys team opened their 2024 season with a trip to Pittsville last Thursday. Both teams took third overall, with the girls team finishing with 51 points and the boys ending the afternoon with 72 points. The girls were narrowly edged out by Marathon for second place, with the Red Raiders taking the runner up spot with 50 points. Meanwhile, Marathon’s boys team dominated, getting the minimum of 15 points and having all seven of their varsity runners finish in the top seven spots.
Colby/Abby’s Matthew Sprotte was the first non-Marathon runner to finish in the boys competition. The junior led the co-op with a time of 21:38, about nine seconds off the pace of Marathon’s Ethan Huebsch who finished just ahead of him, and earned himself eighth place.
Jack Sheahan followed as Colby/Abby’s second runner, putting up a time of 22:18 to take 12th overall. Jacob Raatz and Braylon Schoelzel followed, taking 17th and 22nd respectively with times of 23:10 and 23:26. Preston Belanger was the final scorer for the co-op, taking 28th with a time of 25:13.
Andrew Empey and Kamron Krueger rounded out Colby/Abby’s varsity squad, taking 38th and 39th with times of 28:23 and 28:47.
On the girls side, Annamarie Schmitt grabbed the top spot for the Hornets, posting a time of 24:03. She took ninth overall in the girls race.
Teammate Pearl Feiten picked up the next spot for Colby, taking 10th with a time of 25:21 and the Hornets captured 13th through 15th with Veronica Mateer, Ali Adams and Alexis Vanderhoof finishing back-to-back-to-back. Mateer completed the course in 25:50, Adams ended with a time of 26:20 and Vanderhoof put up a time of 26:34.
Jenelle and Jasmine Ertl finished as Colby’s sixth and seventh runners, with the former taking 21st place with a time of 28:51 and the latter placing 24th with a time of 30:30.
The teams will have their first weekend meet of the season as they travel to Loyal on Saturday, Sept. 7 for their next competition. The start time for the meet is scheduled for 10 a.m.
