By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism.
All Central runners earn either career or season bests at home meet
Zittergruens
Cade (left) and Tyce Zittergruen jockey for position as they head toward the finish line at the Central Invitational. Tyce edged Cade for 11th place by less than a second. (Photo by Bev Hamann)

The Central cross country runners entered the Sept. 17 home meet at the Elkader Golf and Country Club with the plan to “run fast.”

“All week we focused on ‘run fast, run fast, run fast.’ With a good week of practice, the mostly flat and fast course we have, cool weather and the energy of a home meet, we had all the ingredients for a great meet. And we did just that,” said assistant coach Martha Bauder. “Every one of our runners had either a career best or season best.”

The results included a fourth place team finish for the boys, who saw top-15 individual performances from Tyce Zittergruen, Cade Zittergruen and Jesse Polkinghorn. Tyce was 11th of 89 runners, finishing the race in 18:59.8, while Cade was right behind him in 12th with a time of 19:00.1. They were career bests for both. Polkinghorn earned 15th on a season best time of 19:05.

In 19th and 26th place, Cruz Healy and Breckon Holst rounded out the scoring for Central, posting respective career-topping times of 19:17.7 and 19:55.3

Next up, with a mark of 20:02.7, was 27th-place Oliver Holdsworth. Keagan Sylvester finished 34th for the Warriors, running the course in 20:23.1. Lucas Friedlein followed in 39th, on a time of 20:39.6, then Keegan Sperfslage was 52nd in 21:55.3. Rounding out the Central results were Arthur Thiese in 62nd at 22:51, Ayce Clark 78th with a time of 24:09.6, Griffin Koehn 83rd in 25:34.4 and Bently Banks 87th in 27:20.9.

Holst, Koehn, Friedlein, Thiese, Banks, Clark, Sperfslage and Sylvester all had season bests.

Hadley Mueller
Hadley Mueller cruised to 16th in the girls race at the Central Cross Country Invite. (Photo by Bev Hamann)

A 13th-place, career-best run of 21:47.4 from Blair Scherf helped the Warrior girls take third as a team.

Teammate Hadley Mueller cruised to 16th, after completing the course in 22:35.9, while MacKenna Fisher earned a time of 22:51.4 for 20th position. Payton Stannard secured 27th on a time of 23:16.3, followed by Emersyn Wiley in 45th at 25:01.8, Harper Bennington 48th in 25:16 and Anya Whittle 50th in 25:24.5.

Lilly Becwar and Hannah Friedlein placed a respective 62nd and 72nd with times of 26:49.5 and 27:44.3, followed by Claire Orr in 62nd thanks to a mark of 28:19.4. Tenley Meyer posted a time of 32:16.3, which was good for 85th.

According to Bauder, Whittle, Wiley, Fisher, Bennington, Mueller, Meyer and Orr all turned in career bests, while Friedlein, Becwar and Stannard earned their best times of the season.

The coach also cited some intangibles that helped the Warriors achieve their strong results. That included great support from the runners’ classmates, “with so many football players and volleyball players able to come cheer on their classmates.”

Additionally, there was “great attention to the course from the golf course staff, great help from Central Community School administrators and staff, great help from past cross country enthusiasts for on-course supervision and great numbers of fans able to cheer on our runners,” she said.

This week, the boys and girls teams headed to the Waukon Cross Country Invitational on Sept. 22.