After back-to-back years of beating everyone else in Greeley, Josh Torres will have new challenges to look forward to next fall. For this year as last, however, if you ask who the fastest high school harrier in Greeley is, the answer is Josh Torres.
Torres ran 16:25 to do it, beating Central's Simon Kelati by 25 seconds. Where was Levi Chambers, you ask? Well, he was back with his teammates running what appears to have been a soft threshold pace for him.
Although Kelati settled for second, settling for second wasn't on the collective team mind of Greeley Central. The Wildcats backed up Kelati's second with a third from Arturo Toro and a fourth from Ramon Villalobos Ocampo en route to a 34 - 44 team title over second place University.
And I'll chime in with an opinion that a 10-point team margin in a five-team meet is bigger than it seems.
Burke Ewing led the University effort in 17:57 and was the only freshman or sophomore in under 18 minutes.
Ewing's University teammate, and freshman, Kylie Kravig dominated the girls field much as Torres dominated the boys. Kravig posted a winning time of 20:42 that was 12 seconds ahead of Greeley West's Maria Geesaman. It was also Kravig's debut meet title as a high schooler, though she had several fall her way as a middle schooler.
Right on Geesaman's heels in third was teammate Megan Starkey.
If the wind was blowing in Greeley yesterday anything like it was in Colorado Springs, that would account for several seconds on the top of everyone's finishing time.
Greeley West beat Frontier Academy at every scoring position to take the girls team title, 27 - 41. And, although the next little mathematical nugget of cross country lore may not resonate with the reading masses, Greeley West's 27 points amounts to an unbeatable team score. You simply cannot finish any place other than first with a team score of 27 or fewer points. What's less widely known, however, is that 41 points is only one point above an unbeatable score for second (or, if you prefer, the minimum possible third-place score). The only way 41 points doesn't finish in second place or better in cross country, conventionally scored, is if the team scoring goes 39-40-41. In this case, of course, FA made 41 stick for second.
Missing from the Frontier Academy results yesterday was Hannah Ellis. That may or may not turn out to mean something, but it's one of the little clues you begin paying attention to starting about the middle of the season (which would be to say about now).
So, now that the Greeley City Championships are settled and in the books for 2017, there are five teams that can shift their focus to other things. For the Greeley teams that have grown comfortable with staying close to home, though, there is the Andy Myers Invitational next weekend...