Both Iola cross country teams close out the regular season on a high note with both the varsity boys and girls taking the top spot at Independence. The junior varsity boys also finished first while the girls just missed out first by nine points.
On the girl’s side, the Fillie’s finished nine points ahead of host Independence to take the top spot.
“Our girls showed extreme “toughness” during the last part of this race,” head coach Marv Smith said. “I am not sure that our girls want to be described as “tough”, but I was impressed”
Elka Billings led the way, finishing third with a time of 22:24. Rachel Bycroft (23:21) finished sixth, Kelsey Morrison (24:00) finished eighth and Madisyn Holloway (24:55) finished 13th to round out the medal winners.
Lorie Carpenter (25:25) finished 17th, Audrey Coltrane (25:28) finished 19th and Marta Gonzalez (27:03) finished 22nd.
The varsity boys were much more dominant in their race, finishing 20 points ahead of second place Pittsburg.
Jack Adams led the way for the boys, finishing third with a time of 19:18 while Elijah Fawson (19:45) and Nathan Louk (19:57) rounded out the top 10 finishing seventh and 10th.
Cole Regehr (19:57) who finished 11th and Bret Plumlee (20:27) who finished 15th also medaled.
Riley Jay closed out the Mustangs, finishing 22nd with a time of 21:17.
The junior varsity girls were led by Nora Gostner who led the Fillie’s in their second place finish with a time of 27:19 which was good for fourth.
Kylee Maloney (28:37) who finished seventh, Ella Taylor (29:16) who finished 10th and Callie Murcko (29:20) who finished 12th all medaled while Olivia Taylor (35:42) who finished 19th and Kaylin Klubek (35:59) who finished 20th did not.
No one was close to catching the junior varsity boys who finished 33 points ahead of second place Parsons.
Tavon Bass finished ahead of everybody with a time of 21:49 while Nathan Sprague finished right behind in second with a time of 21:49.
Black Harr (22:36) finished fourth and River Hess (24:05) finished fourth with a season-best time to grab a medal.
Grant Luedke (24:05) finished 21st, Jonathan Rodewald (26:51) finished 23rd, Eli Smith (32:32) finished 31rd and Josh Kaufman (33:13) finished 33rd.
