Cooper Wiens was the top finisher for a victorious Gunnison Cowboy team on Friday. Colorado Track XC file photo by Alan Versaw.
If either of the larger schools swooping in on Salida on Friday were hoping for an easy course or pushover field of competition, they got neither.
The truth is, though, that you had to have been blowing through some pretty big clues to have been expecting either.
The boys race boiled down to a classic 3A brawl (figuratively speaking, of course) between Gunnison and Salida. And, for a Gunnison team that has been having trouble putting things together ever since the UNM Lobo meet in early September, this was a significant win.
Salida took an early advantage on Taylor Stack's winning 16:59, but Gunnison was able to overcome the Spartan advantage with a stead stream of finishers beginning with Cooper Wiens at 17:33. Jon Wilkinson closed out the Cowboy scoring in 13th at 18:52 while homestanding Salida still had only three runners across the line.
The final tally had...
