Georgia boys XC had a terrific meet at Nike Regionals as Brookwood qualified for the Nike Nationals in a very fast, unpredictable race that required quite a few minutes afterwards to sort out the results with the Broncos scoring 214 points and taking 2nd overall on a 6th runner tiebreaker. Parkview's Alec Klassen also will be making the trek to Portland with his monster 3rd place run in 15:19.50.
The weather was nice for racing Saturday morning in Cary, NC, a little chilly, but tolerable, really. The boys race was taken out hard, as it always is on that course, since the first mile is down hill and fast. No one had broken away from the pack, really, at the mile, and the leaders were through around 4:40. At the 2.5k split, the Brookwood guys were in 6th place, having gotten out fast, but having some work to do in the second half of the race. Drew Vander Wood (BW's #5 on the day) picked up nearly 30 places in that second half, and that ended up being the difference.
After the race, the Broncos were pleased with how they had competed, but no one was sure how it would turn out. The pervasive feeling around the BW camp was that they had not qualified - runners estimated that we had scored nearly 200 points, and we didn't think that would finish top 2. Early-season #1 (Sean Brennan) finished 7th, and just isn't in the form he was coming back from an injury mid-season, and our #5 from the state meet, Zac Brooks, chose not to run. Not to mention, this was clearly the best boys field ever assembled at the NXN SE regional meet.
In spite of these facts, the Brookwood boys qualified on a tiebreaker, with our #6 finishing far ahead of Walter Johnson's #6. Once more, the team was proud to qualify as a result of their depth, as that has been a key component this year, and this was especially meaningful since Brookwood was, in a way, down two guys.
Alec Klassen had a spectacular race for Parkview leading the Lilburn club to a 5th place team finish with his 3rd place overall in 15:19.50 with Steven Spevacek not far behind in 11th clocking a 15:34.60. Parkview was only 15 points behind Brookwood with a team average of 15:59.84 actually besting the Broncos 16:02 average. Collins Hill placed 24th as a team led by Andy Gonzalez's 54th overall in 16:11.40. Brendan Hoban led St.Pius with a 48th place effort in 16:08.81 and Mill Creek's Austin Boetje paced the Hawks with an outstanding 14th place in 15:39.00
No Georgia Girls team competed in the Championship race but Anna Bowles came out as our top Individual placing 13th overall with a fine time of 18:16.20. Sarah Bowles placed 45th in 19:03. Former Ga athletes Rebecca and Rachel Greenwall helped drive Baylor School of Tennessee to a sweet 5th place team effort with Rebecca clocking a 19:00 and Rachel turning in 19:31. Brookwood's gals competed in the Girls Open race actually winning the Team title with a 20:40 team average led by Ashley Buda's 4th place overall in 20:17.90.