Pahrump Valley’s senior runner, Bryce Odegard finished first (16 minutes, 21 seconds), in the 5,000-meter race to help the Trojans boys to a second-place finish (48 points) at the Clark County Fairgrounds at the Moapa Valley Invitational last week.
Odegard was running against 46 other runners.
“We went up against a lot of small schools,” Trojans head cross-country coach Matt Kolodzieczyk said. “If we had two runners who had other commitments it would have been different. But Bryce (Odegard) ran a good race and everyone is improving a lot.”
Faith Lutheran was the overall winner (39), third place was Moapa Valley (58).
The boys team competed against six other schools.
The next Trojans runner was Grant Odegard (17:53) eighth place, Cole Goodman (18:01) ninth place, Michael Sonerholm (18:11) 10th place, Ulisses Perez (20:24) 25th place and Craig Moore (20:32) finished 26th.
“Grant Odegard has worked really hard too,” the coach said. “He was the next runner to finish for us.”
The girls team finished second (53 ) against five teams. Sadie Oakley (20:40) of Faith Lutheran took first place out of 17 girls.
Senior Trojans runner, Grace Plumb (22:36) finished in seventh place and was the top runner for the girls team. She was followed by sophomore Diamond Sonerholm (23:12) 10th place, senior Cynthia Martin (23:38) 12th place, junior Katherine Goodman (23:46) 13th place, sophomore Terrena Martin (24:24) 17th place, junior Neele Stelljes (26:55) 25th place and freshman Shailyn Winter (27:09) 28th place.
“Diamond (Sonerholm) needs some work still, she cramped up during the race, but she still managed to finish well,” Kolodzieczyk said. “Grace (Plumb) worked all summer to be the top runner of the team and it is paying off. She has improved tremendously. The way the girls are running, we have a good shot at taking state this year.”
Pahrump had two runners running in the varsity B race.
Junior Mindy Broderick (32:37) finished 16th and Carmen Changano (45:40) finished 17th.
Middle school runners
There was also a middle school division with five schools in it.
Noah Espeleta (9:19) of Leavitt Middle School finished in first place. Pahrump’s Rosemary Clarke Middle School sent one student, eighth grader, Seth Sonerholm (9:47) who finished in fourth place out of 12 runners on the 1.6-mile course.
Big race
The Trojans will run at the University of Nevada Las Vegas Invitational against 20 teams on Saturday morning.
Contact sports editor Vern Hee at vhee@pvtimes.com