Entering the meet the boy's course record stood at 16:25, which was bound to go down...
But with Thursday's four inches of snowmelt coating the course in pockets of soggy mess, fast times weren't inevitable, just, hopeful...
A month ago Green Mountain's Grahm Tuohy-Gaydos missed the course record by five seconds with his 16:30 victory at the Standley Lake Gator Invite. That day he beat Golden's Bryce Reeburgh by six seconds, while Colin Szuch was a half-minute back on a tempo-run days before his big run at Liberty Bell.
That race would be a blueprint of sorts for Tuohy-Gaydos - he had won here before over the same competition, he could do it again.
And that's exactly what he did.
The trio ran in a tight pack off and away early. While the size of the gap behind them was huge, the gap between them was minimal. Heading out into the final small loop they ran tight, and it appeared that it could still be anyone's race.
Tuohy-Gaydos hit the final straight first, though he shared it with Szuch and Reeburgh, as both were still nipping at his shadow.
The Green Mountain junior took the boy's 4A title - his eighth victory of the season - in a new course record of 15:49 (which would stand for maybe half an hour...) Szuch and Reeburgh were also well under the record, running 15:52 and 15:57.
As tight as the individual race was, so was the team race.
Szuch's runner-up finish turned out to be huge for Evergreen, as they took the team title by just five points over Littleton, 48-53. And Green Mountain was just six points behind Littleton, scoring 59.
Next Page: Wilson Leads Valor Christian to victory...