Courtesy of Shari Miller

In the girls race, sophomore Sylvia Brubaker ran a solid race to place 7th and make the podium.  Her time was 20:07.  Next for the Indians, was freshman Carolyn Heidenreich in 62nd place with a time of 23:17.  Freshman Hannah Zeiders ran to a 98th place finish in a time of 24:57.  Baylee Espinosa from Lewisburg won the girls AA race with a time of 18:59.  Juniata did not have enough runners to compete in the team competition.  Juniata coach Jeff Miller said “Sylvia had her best race of the season today.  Carolyn and Hannah ran well on the challenging Hershey course.  This was their first race on this course and it will benefit them in the future since the Hershey course can take several times to figure out how to race it.”

In the boys AA race, senior Wyatt Stroup ran to a 6th place finish with a time of 16:42 to make the podium.  Senior Joey Bomberger came in shortly after in 8th place with a time of 16:48 to make the podium also.  Coming in next for the Indians was senior Wesley Ehrisman in 65th place with a time of 18:55.  Sophomore Coy Kerstetter placed 71st with a time of 18:59.  Senior Teagan Trout rounded out the scoring with a 105th place finish in a time of 19:40.  Junior Kade Wagner ran a personal best time of 20:31 to place 129th.  Juniata placed 5th out of 30 teams with 227 points and Grove City Area won the boys teams title with 36 points.  MJ Pottinger from Grove City Area won the boys race with a time of 16:17.  Juniata was 7th as a team in 2023 at this invitational.  Juniata coach Jeff Miller said “The boys ran tough today.  Wesley got spiked early in the race and lost his shoe which cost him a good bit of time and places.  Thankfully he didn’t get injured.  Wyatt, Joey, Coy, Teagan and Kade all ran personal best for this difficult course.  Coy and Teagan ran about one minute faster than last year at this race so that’s a good sign with 5 weeks until districts.  Joey and Wyatt were up in the top 5 places at the two mile mark, but struggled over the last 1k to drop several places.  We haven’t run many hard workouts this season, so I ‘m sure we can improve on their ability to close strong in the last 1k when it matters at districts and states.  We will soon have more time to fit in some specific workouts as our race schedule gets lighter in early October.

Juniata had 3 boys take part in the high school JV race.  Sophomore Joel Hardin ran to 114th place with a time of 22:40.  Freshman David Mayall-Marker came in shortly after in 120th place in a time of 23:08.  Senior Luke Fowler placed 131st with a time of 24:19.  Owen Viglione from State College won the boys race in a time of 18:01.  Juniata coach Jeff Miller said “This was the first time for Luke and David running this course and they ran well.  Joel took over one minute off his time from 2023 at this same invitational.”  Juniata travels to Carlisle Invitational on Saturday, September 28th.