LaFayette squads beat county foes
Gordon Lee, Ridgeland and LaFayette met up on Friday at LaFayette High School for a picture-perfect day for racing as the three schools battled in the annual Walker County Championships.
LaFayette took first place in the girls’ race with 17 points, while Ridgeland was second with 43. Gordon Lee did not have enough runners to qualify for the team award.
The Lady Ramblers had the individual champion in Madison Todd, who came home in 23:19. Dakota Tabor was third with a 24:55 and Bianca Rogers place fifth at 25:47. LaFayette also saw Natalie Ball (26:12) place seventh (26:12), Brittany Aguero (26:26) take eighth and Alethea Hendrix (27:01) finish 10th.
Also racing for LaFayette was Natashia Cooper (27:37), Addison Hurst (30:21) and Olivia Cornejo (35:59).
Gordon Lee’s Haley Hartman (24:20) was the runnerup and Cora Fehr (25:07) placed fourth. The Lady Trojans’ other runner was Isabella Rodgers (29:23).
For the Lady Panthers, Mary Scott clocked in with a time of 25:55 to take sixth while Cate Voyles (26:45) was ninth. The rest of the Ridgeland roster featured Sydney Finch (27:16), Paige Blanchard (28:11), Aubree Bagwell (28:20) and Macie
Boren (29:49).
LaFayette also won a close contest in the boys’ race with 35 points. Ridgeland (42) and Gordon Lee (49) took second and third, respectively.
Tucker Henderson was the individual champion for the Ramblers as he navigated the course in 17:47. Josh Perea (19:13) was third. Steven Sanford (20:18) was ninth and Dylan Ballew (20:25) placed 10th.
Also racing for LaFayette was Jacob Hamilton (20:43), Caden Hinton (20:54), Crandale Jackson (21:01), Alex Hollaway (21:24), Nathan Ball (21:56), Scott Sanford (22:28), Jacob Gilbreath (27:55), Gage Henderson (30:01) and Eli Prince (34:17).
Ridgeland was paced by fifth-place A.J. Walker (19:40), sixth-place Josh Wingard (19:48) and seventh-place Beau Baker (19:52). Sam Dickson (20:28), Matthew Cole (20:46), Kevin Schmelzer (20:51), Henry Holden (22:18), Sean Gifford (22:35), Luke Wilhelm (23:25), Brently Hayes (25:35) and Peter Tracy (26:50). also raced for the Panthers.
As for the Trojans, Jake Lee turned in a 17:55 to take runner-up honors. Carson Carpenter (19:23) was fourth and Carter Pullen (20:04) was eighth, while the rest of the Trojans’ roster included Cody McCutcheon (21:02), Luke Taylor (21:43), Carter Ball (24:00) and Aiden Goodwin (24:55).