Boys
McAlpine proved to be just as hot as the rest of the country temperature and time wise. The day kicked off with the Boys Open race where Lambert showed up. Noah Schaich was the top Lambert boy in 16:22 for 21st place. Lambert then put their next two boys under the 17 minute mark, which helped propel them to an 8th place finish with an average time of 17:17. The Boys Invitational was next with a showdown between Flowery Branch (#9 all-class) and Etowah (#6 all-class) along with Lakeside DeKalb and Loganville. The race got off to a hot start with a big pack of guys headed for sub-16 5k times. The top Georgia boy in this race was Davis Stockwell of Lakeside with an impressive 16:03 and 14th overall, 1st for Georgia athletes. Following closely was Blake Beavers of Etowah at 16:09 (21st) with fellow sophomore teammate Sam Donley also at 16:09 (22nd). Flowery Branch followed with their #1 Jake Shewbert in 23rd place in 16:11, all 4 of which are sophomores. Next was Flowery Branch’s #2 Nick Ashmead in 16:20 followed by Etowah’s Michael Perona in 16:21. After the dust settled Flowery Branch and Etowah were in a tie for 3rd place with 189 points apiece and a 16:29 average time. Flowery Branch won the 6th man tiebreaker by 5 spots. Lakeside DeKalb finished 12th (17:04 average), and Loganville in 35th. Next was Westminster (#1 AA) running in the Boys 3A race. Jordan Flowers looked back to original form with an overall PR of 16:08 to finish 8th in his race and 2nd overall for the state of Georgia. Following this Westminster’s #2-4 runners piled in all right together around 17 minutes and their 5th at 17:15. This was good enough for a 3rd place finish 16:52 average. In the meet combined results Etowah finished 5th, Flowery Branch 8th, Westminster 15th, Lakeside DeKalb 24th, Lambert 32nd, and Loganville 82nd.
Girls
First on the girls side was the Girls Open race with Lambert. Jamie Angle was the top Longhorn with a 32nd finish in 20:19. Lambert then was able to put their #2-4 girls under the 21 minute mark to finish 8th with a 20:45 average. The Girls Invitational had some very impressive times as well. Morgan Mihalis of Lakeside DeKalb was the top Georgia finisher with a time of 18:47, good enough for 11th place; this was followed up by Kingsley Green of Etowah who finished in 13th with a time of 18:48. Both of these girls threw themselves into the conversation for top in their respective classes at state with these performances. Etowah followed up with their #2 Kyla Resnick in 19:06 and their #3 Madison Fowler in 19:44. At the end of the race Etowah had moved up to 5th with a 19:51 average, Lakeside was 16th with a 20:38 average, Loganville in 28th, and Flowery Branch in 29th. Overall Etowah finished 8th in the combined results, Lambert 26th, Lakeside 27th, Loganville 42nd, and Flowery Branch 48th.