Ava Cross Country Team Runs Springfield Catholic Irish Invitational

The Ava Bears cross country team attended the Irish Invitational held at the Springfield Underground on Oct. 7.
Nine runners beat their times from the same meet last year, despite the high temps and high humidity of the day.
In the boys varsity race, Caleb Stillings finished 7th overall with a time of 17:12 which was 5 seconds faster than last year.  Logan Sicilia finished in the  32nd spot overall with a time of 18:10.  Drew Adams and Cole Atnip finished only three-one hundredths of a second between them with Drew nudging Cole for the 93rd spot. Cole was 94th.
Sage Clunn ran a 20:19 for 113th place and improved his time by 1 minute, 1 second over last year.  Jonah Brown had a 20:54 and placed 130.  His time was 1:18 faster than last year. Jacob Luebbering ran a 21:06 for 137th.
Brett Mitchell had a time of 21:31 to place 143 and was 1:47 faster. Braden Swofford took 151st with a 22:02. Reece Goforth had a 23:49 for 171st place.  There were 184 runners in the varsity boys race.
Phillip Canfield from Republic ran a 16:29 to win the race with Jesse Herd from Branson coming in 2nd with a 16:37.
The Ava Boys took 6th place out of 14 full teams in the Class 1 and 2 division. Springfield Catholic won the meet as a team.
The Ava ladies finished third out of seven full teams with 75 points, Stockton was first as a team with 40 points and Springfield Catholic with 59 points.  Blue Eye had 128 points for 4th. Tabitha Weber from Marshfield continues her local dominance and won the race in 19:38.
Bailey Ray placed 15th and ran a 21:46, only 11 seconds off her best time of the season, which was an improvement of 2:17 over last year’s Irish meet.  Darci Ray placed 38th with a time of 23:03.
Kim Copeland placed 51st with a time of 23:43. Megan Cooper ran a 24:04 for the 63rd spot and improved her time from last year by 1:25.
Tori Kuz competed for the first time with the varsity team. She placed 75th and ran a new career PR of 24:54, improving by 1:28 over her best time ever.  JimiLynn Raybould ran a 25:44 which was a pr from last year by 42 seconds and placed 90th.  Hailey Pedersen ran a 26:58 for 102nd place.
In the junior high races, Gavin Goss ran a new PR in the 1.8 mile race. His time was 12:54, an improvement of 1:56 from last year. Gavin placed 93rd out of 181. Emily Stillings ran a 14:39, averaging 7:50 per mile to place 76th out 174.