Moapa’s Thompson, Palo Verde’s Koch win Labor Day Classic
Josh Thompson had to wait one more race to make sure his time couldn’t be beaten Saturday.
The Moapa Valley junior posted the day’s best time in the Las Vegas Labor Day Classic, completing the 2.86-mile course at Palo Verde in 15 minutes, 7.7 seconds, just one-tenth of a second better than Centennial sophomore Nick Hartle, though the two didn’t really run against each other.
The classic has four separate races for boys — based on their year in school — and four more for girls.
Hartle posted a time of 15:07.8, which Thompson beat, albeit barely. No runners in the senior boys race could top the time. Green Valley’s Julius Kim came closest, finishing in 15:17, the third-best time of the day.
No team scores were kept in the event.
The next three fastest times also were turned in by Green Valley seniors — Matt Campa-Moreno (15:29), D.J. Padilla-Montello (15:36) and Jason Ferraro (15:40).
Rounding out the top-10 fastest times for the boys were senior Scott Albright of Centennial (15:42); junior Chase Witter of Moapa Valley (16:03); and senior Sebastian Karbowniczek (16:08) and junior Tomas Johnson (16:14), both from Palo Verde.
Dallin Albright of Centennial won the freshman boys race in 17:48.
Green Valley’s boys showed the greatest depth as a team. In addition to putting up four of the six fastest times, the Gators had senior Cagen Combs turning in the 12th-fastest time of the day by placing seventh in the senior boys race with a time of 16:14.
Palo Verde’s Kelsi Koch posted the time to beat for the girls, finishing the juniors race in 19:10. It was more than good enough as only one other runner came with 35 seconds of Koch’s time.
The next four fastest times were turned in by junior Joslyn Evans of Liberty (19:19); junior Alyssa Rapovy of Green Valley (19:46); and a pair of seniors, Genesis Cerrato of Valley (19:49) and Hayley Davis of Centennial (19:51).
The next five fastest girls were Valley junior Kimberly Guzman (19:54); Green Valley senior Morgan Oswald (19:55) and junior Alison Leedham (20:21); Centennial senior Ashley Davis (20:22); and Palo Verde junior Nicole Vanderstelt. (20:35).
Victoria Moran of Palo Verde won the sophomore girls race in 20:39, and Palo Verde’s Sarah Leiserowitz won the freshman girls race in 20:44.
Palo Verde and Green Valley demonstrated the greatest team depth with each team putting up four of the top 15 times. Centennial had three runners place in the top 15 and Valley two.
