The ebbs and flows of emotions shifted several times in the final stages of the race as Ariana Toland and Casey Griggs battled for the lead and the win. Photo by Alan Versaw.
Mulitiple lead changes are typically more the norm for basketball than for cross country, but you wouldn't have known that by watching the final 300 meters of the varsity girls race at the Fountain-Fort Carson Invitational.
As the competitors came off the canal trail east of the school and onto the expansive grass of the Fountain-Fort Carson athletic fields, it was Vanguard's Ariana Toland clinging to a narrow lead over TCA's Casey Griggs. Griggs sensed an opportunity and surged into the lead.
But Toland wasn't as spent as Griggs had guessed. She wasn't having any of going down easily. Toland counter-surged, taking her lead back and opening a gap of neary 10 meters with about 150 metes to go. Coming into the final 80 meters, Toland was two or three strides ahead, moving with a good cadence, an...
