Mary Persons Cross Country teams competed in the AT&T Starr’s Mill Panther Meet hosted by Starr’s Mill High School in Fayetteville on Saturday, Aug. 31. The meet had 22 elite performances by MileSplit Georgia standards, ranging from 15:04-16:25 times in the 5000-meter runs in boys events and from 18:32-19:40 in girls 5000-meter events. Unfortunately, none of the elite performances were by Mary Persons runners, but they responded well to the level of competition.
In the girls Varsity race, the Lady Bulldogs finished 15th out of 24 teams, with 180 runners in the race. Senior Gabriella Hoover was the top Mary Persons finisher with a time of 19:53, finishing 11th overall. The Second Lady Bulldog to complete the course was freshman Camryn Miller at 22:41, followed by Lily Colley at 22:59, freshman Daranna Delgado Garcia at 23:19 and Olivia Tanner at 23:26.
The winning schools were 1st Marist, 2nd Harrison, 3rd Harris County.
The Mary Persons boys varsity team placed 22nd out of 27 teams. The top teams were 1st Harrison, 2nd Marist, 3rd Starr’s Mill. Senior Mac Roeser was the top Mary Persons runner with a time of 18:50.
With 204 runners in the event, the next three Bulldogs to finish the race were Bradley Hendricks (19:13), Gavin Cabe (19:52) and Grant Fair (20:04), with junior Gabriel Lee completing the scoring runs for Mary Persons at 20:12.
There were 156 runners in the Freshman boys 5000-meter race. Mary Persons finished 13th out of 15 teams. The top six Mary Persons competitors were Ridge Lumley 21:41, Chase Stankowitz 22:39, Charles Tanner 23:24, Shane Hall 24:16, Cy Bevill 26:06. Aaron Hallman 26:08.
Mary Persons didn’t enter any runners in the Freshman girls 5000-meter competition, but four Lady Bulldogs ran the 5000-meter Girls Junior Varsity race. Since five runners are required for a team score, Mary Persons didn’t place with the 14 teams that completed the race. Among the 187 runners, the times for the Lady Bulldogs were: Ella Martin (37th overall) 24:01, Carolyn Goode 27:14, Niya Beitin 28:54, Abigail Buice 33:40.
In the boys junior varsity 5000-meter race, the Bulldogs placed 17th out of 23 teams. The JV race fielded 316 runners. The top runners for the Mary Persons team were: Gavin Mitchell 20:59, Matthew Biers 21:28, Jordan Mullis 21:29, Ben Chase 22:12, Hunter Geer 25:36.
The Monroe County Middle School teams didn’t compete at the Starr’s Mill Meet.
On Thursday, Sept. 5 the Mary Persons Cross Country teams will be at the starting line at the GMC Bulldog Dash in Milledgeville. Rather than on the GMC campus, the course will be at Council Farms. Registration for the event is full, with 32 teams signed up for the various races.
On Saturday, Sept. 7 the Bulldogs will get a chance to practice on the state meet course at the Carrollton Invite presented by OrthoWest in Carrollton. The Bulldogs will be in competition a little closer to home on Thursday, Sept. 12 at the Hornet Hustle in Macon.
