Austin Taylor

Check out the top 500 boys and girls historic performances from the Starr's Mill XC Meet

Check out the top historic performances from the AT&T Starr's Mill Panther XC Meet

Check out the top 25 performances all time from boys at the Georgia Middle School State Meet in each event

This race had the best course conditions of the meet with Landmark repeating as Team Champs while Griffin McCauley of Paideia took the Overall title.

A Private Boys is a down somewhat this Fall, individually and in team strength, which will make for an interesting first race of the day at 7:45am.

Helen Williams of AIS scorched the course posting an 18:02, McCauley wins Boys Overall, Landmark Sweeps titles. (Cover Photo by Daniel McCauley)

Landmark Christian is definitely the favorite to sweep the Team Titles. At last year's Region Championship, the weather was insane...

Only 1125 runners participated at the annual Last Chance meet at the 'State Course' Saturday. Very few ranked larger school teams ran their varsities or came at all, with those in attendance taking advantage all around, giving their JVs a chance to test out the layout. In 2 weeks though, this venue will be electric..can you feel it?

Weather looked to be an issue coming into this meet late Friday, but, after the course got a good soakin' overnight, it seemed to drain quite well by the early 'dark' start of the Championship Boys race. A thick blanket of mist enveloped the fields at first, but, as the morning progressed, it steadily rose up to reveal the beautiful, flat course ahead.

Some great performances from the Boys 'ROWs' including 6A's Andrew Kent of Lakeside DK and from 5A, the 'Branch's' Jake Shewbert .

Over 1400 runners gathered at the State Course on Saturday having great mid-September racing conditions in very uncrowded race situations for this venue. (excluding Championship Boys) Anticipation was high for those races with many top squads and Indivduals competing.Brief ReCap (more coming Monday)

1A Private Boys is going to be absolutely wide open this Fall as the top 6 finishers from State have moved on to the next level. However, from 7-20 there are 11 underclassmen that are will be battling for supremacy, including a few who had great Outdoor seasons that will be in/near that front pack with good training. Five athletes with sub 17: prs returning are Will Martin from First Presbyterian Day (also top underclassman at State) Griffin McCauley and Max Heaberlin from Paideia who had good Summer Camps at Nike, Sam Shaylor (All State XC) from North Cobb Christian and Sammy Clough of Providence Christian. Jihoon Choi of Athens Academy had a strong Outdoor season and placed 8th at XC State.

Mother Nature gave Old Man Winter a nudge Saturday, letting him know his days are numbered. The opening meet of the 2015 season at Landmark Christian was hugely popular, with the maximum number of schools participating. Although a steady headwind down the finishing straightaway made conditions challenging, this did not deter very enthusiastic competition.

The Class A Private Boys race has one definitive fact about it: What time will Reilly Friedman post and will it be good enough in the last competitive boys race of the day to win the Best Performance award?  His team, the Scots of Galloway are in contention for the state title vs a hungry Hebron Christian Lions squad.  A Private boys are a little weaker overall with Darlington, Holy Innocents and Pace moving up to 2A and those teams are all in contention in the AA races Saturday.

I was there at 8am watching the wind gusts nearly blow over the finish line frameposts and destroy a couple of team canopies across the street as mother nature was rearing its ugly head, making conditions nearly miserable unless one had spent winters up north.  Galloway's boys shone placing 5 runners in the top eight, posting an impressive 24 points to win the Region 5-A / Area 3 Championship., and Landmark's gals easily secured the team title as Kathryn Foreman won the Overall title...

Reilly Friedman left the pack early and cruised to the Individual title in 16:29 for the Galloway Scots' easily defending his 2012 title. Landmark Christian came thu in clutchtime running epecially well as a team capturing the coveted 1A Private team title scoring 102 points outdistancing a game Darlington squad by 23 points and 2nd ranked Athens Christian by 28. Spencer Geerlings led the Eagles' win finishing 11th.