Chiles train rolls on to State

Chiles High School continued its dominating performances by winning both the boys and girls 3A Region 1 championships on Saturday. Alex Miletich put another trophy on his shelf with a winning time of 15:40.43. Chiles’ boys finished 1, 4, 6, 8 and 10th to score 29 points convincingly beating second place Washington High’s 62. Leon finished 10th with 306 points to end its season. In the girls meet, Maria Hampton finished less than three seconds (19:08.28) behind winner Kelly Parrish (19:05.85, Vanguard High) to lead the girls’ team to victory with 52 points (2, 9, 11, 14 and 16). Niceville was second with 103 points.

The 2A region 1 meet was hosted by Godby High School at the Miccosukee Greenway. It was a fitting reward for the school having its boys and girls teams in the regional for the first time. Bishop Kenny ruined the local party though by winning both the boys and girls races with an overwhelming show of force. The boys swept the top five to score a perfect 15 points, while the girls scored 23 with finishes in 1, 3, 5, 6 and 8th place. Mallory Wellman ran 19:09.36 to win the girls race and William Mullaney was a fraction under 16:00 to win the boys race. The top local finishers were Stephen Arnold (17th) and LaShaunta Arnold (15th) from Rickards. LaShaunta qualified for the state meet with her 20:57.15 finish. East Gadsden High, under the direction of new coach Dave Halliday, is headed to the state meet in its first year of existence (the school is a combination of Shanks and Quincy High Schools) after capturing 6th at the meet. Halliday has a history of building programs and seems ready to do a repeat just to the west of us. Godby finished 10th, after losing its number one runner to injury and Wakulla High took the 12th spot. On the girls side, Rickards finished 8th and Godby again was 10th.

The 1A teams had to travel to Jacksonville, but both Maclay and surprising Aucilla Christian advanced to the state meet finishing fourth and fifth in the girls division and fourth (Maclay) in the boys division. Olivia and Trinstan Sorenson led Aucilla with 8th (20:49.29) and 10th (20:56.89) finishes. Robyn Debenedit (Episcopal) won the girls race in a time of 18:15.11. Adrianna Piekarewicz finished 12th to lead Maclay. Maclay’s boys were led by Brennon Clayton who ran 17:22.80 to finish 12th, well behind winner Justin Jackson (Episcopal High) who ran 16:31.50. North Florida Christian’s boys were 10th.

Complete results are at www.flrunners.com.