NCS races halted by poor air

The North Coast Section got in half of a cross-country meet Tuesday before the air quality soured.

Five of the section-championship races had been held in Hayward, but the rest were canceled because of poor air quality, leaving a committee to determine which competitors will advance to Saturday’s state championship meet in Fresno.

The NCS championships originally were scheduled for Saturday at Hayward High.

However, smoke from the Camp Fire in Butte County forced officials to reschedule the event for Tuesday — one of dozens of athletic events that have been postponed, sometimes multiple times, in the wake of the fire.

And the NCS is not alone. The Central Coast Section meet was postponed from Nov. 10 to Sunday and also moved to Salinas. The Academic Athletic Association championships were postponed three times before officials opted to cancel them Monday.

NCS bylaws prohibit outdoor athletic contests from being held if the Air Quality Index is over 150. The poor air cleared enough Tuesday morning to allow for the races to take place, with the first scheduled for 8:30 a.m. But air measurements were made before the start or each race and by the time the girls Division 3 race was scheduled to start at 10:35, the AQI had climbed to 154. At that point, the rest of the races were canceled.

With the state meet looming in four days and Thursday being Thanksgiving, officials thought Tuesday was the last chance they had to complete the meet.

When the rest of the races were called off, a committee of coaches and officials formed and began going through the other divisions to select qualifiers to Saturday’s state meet. The AAA had a similar situation and used qualifying marks to select its entries.

Among the three boys races that were completed, De La Salle-Concord’s Connor Livingston had the best time — finishing the 3-mile course in 14 minutes, 45.8 seconds to win the Division 2 section title. Dublin’s Loic Scomparin won the Division 1 race in 14:53.7 and Liam Anderson of Redwood-Larkspur was the Division 3 titlist in 15:02.7.

Granada-Livermore’s Colleen McCandless won the girls Division 2 race in 17:22.8 and Amador Valley-Pleasanton’s Hope Bergmark won Division 1 in 17:45.