Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Madisonville-North Hopkins runners Gary Bozeman and Taylor Partlow claimed top individual honors on Tuesday evening, but the Hopkins County Central boys took first as a team as the two schools competed in their annual season-opening meet at Madisonville City Park.
The rival schools split team victories with North boasting the girls’ victory, but both schools found positive results in their first race of the year.
The Lady Maroons finished first and second in Partlow, a freshman, and Bonnie Burden, an eighth-grader.
After the meet North coach Kris Wallace said despite their age, the duo have experience.
“They’re young, but that didn’t surprise me,” Wallace said. “At the end of the season last year they were both part of our top seven.”
Partlow said when she begins to tire down the final leg she thinks “cool” thoughts.
“When I’m tired I think, ‘just get done, get to the water, get to the cold air, get to the air conditioning.’”
Behind Partlow (24:56) and Burden (26:04), the Lady Storm finished three of the next four racers in Kaylee Smith, Crystal White and Mattie Russell.
“Those three all year – they’ve really been pushing each other when they train together,” Central girls’ coach Kent Akin said. “I thought the three of them would be really close.”
Smith finished just tenths of a second ahead of White (26:21.8). Central captain Mattie Russell finished a minute later in sixth place after experiencing a bit of a leg cramp in her final lap, which slowed her pace.
Russell, a junior, finished strong however, holding off North’s Emily Gallegos by a second.
Once Russell finished, she said coming down the stretch she told herself to pull it out for her teammates.
“(I said) ‘I have to finish. I have a leadership spot on the team. I have to do my best to finish for them.’”
For the North boys, Bozeman also stepped up in his leadership role to pace his team, finished 15 seconds better than his goal of 19:52.
During the last half-mile Bozeman said he looked behind to see where his nearest competitor was and seeing he had a comfortable margin, he said, “I think I got this.”
Bozeman finished nearly 30 seconds better than the next racer, but Central claimed the next four places en route to its team victory.
Storm runner Corey Eakins led his team at 20:03 and Connor Moore placed third overall at 20:45.
While most runners who crossed the line hunched over as the pain began to take control, Moore showed few signs of exhaustion.
Moore said he runs 10K races during the summer to stay in shape and that has helped him for high school competition.
“I felt great after the race,” he said. “I feel like I’m in shape, ready for the season.”
Maroon runner Aaron Poe showed he was ready for his first varsity race as well. The seventh-grader finished eighth overall with a time of 23:50.
Many of Poe’s teammates have named him the “golden boy,” but Poe said the key to his success is simple.
“What helps me keep going is I look at something really far ahead of me and then I don’t take my eye off of it and keep going, just watch that spot,” he said.
Both North and Central will race again 9 a.m. Sept. 6 in the Maroon Invitational.
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