Bulldog boys tie for third at league meet
Ramona High School’s boys cross-country team tied for third place at the Valley League meet Nov. 15 at Kit Carson Park.
Valley Center won the league meet with 42 points while Mount Carmel finished second with 55 points. Ramona and Westview each had 65 points, and San Marcos finished fifth with 124 points.
Oceanside rounded out the team standings with 126 points.
Orange Glen did not have enough runners to earn a team score, but the Patriots’ Diego Vega won the individual competition.
Vega crossed the finish line of the 5,000-meter (3.1-mile) course in 16:31. Ramona junior Paul Reynolds finished fourth with a time of 16:57.
“Superb race,” Coach Steve Emery said of Reynolds. “I love watching that kid run.”
The top 10 finishers at the league meet earn first-team all-league status while the runners who finish 11th through 20th are given second-team all-league honors.
Three Bulldogs earned second-team distinction: Dylan Blankenbaker’s time of 17:47 netted 11th place, Chance Varnardo-Richardson placed 13th at 17:52, and Chris Fabian finished 17th after running the course in 17:59.
In the Southern California Invitational meet Oct. 18, Blankenbaker pulled a muscle and did not finish. He did not return to varsity competition until a Nov. 7 dual meet.
“This is an awesome turnaround,” Emery said. “He’s in full swing, no question about it.”
Fabian has had a respiratory illness and a pulled hamstring this season and did not run between Oct. 10 and Nov. 7.
“He’s making a comeback,” Emery said. “Just happy for him.”
Ramona’s fifth finisher was Nathan Morgan, who took 25th place. Morgan’s time of 18:13 gave the Bulldogs a 1:16 split between the first five runners.
“These guys are solid,” Emery said.
In a cross country dual meet, the positions of the first five finishers for each team are added to determine the team score.
While a team’s sixth and seventh finishers are not scored, if they finish ahead of any of the other team’s top five runners their places would add positions to the opponents’ score.
Tanner Perfect was Ramona’s sixth finisher, taking 29th place with a time of 18:20. Max Hughes finished 34th at 18:31.
The CIF meet will be held this Saturday at the Morley Field course in San Diego. Seven runners from each team will participate, and Emery will likely take the top seven finishers at the league meet as well as two alternates.
“We’ll see what we can get out of that,” Emery said of the CIF meet.