Several Escalon High School cross country team members made the trip to Rio Linda over the weekend, competing at Gibson Ranch.

“We rested our varsity team that has qualified for Mount SAC, but the rest of the team ran,” said coach Rick Heflin. “What most people don’t realize when they see times for cross country is that there usually are several hills or mountains on the course. That is the main reason our team is so thankful for the community support we get so we can train in the mountains on our training weekend. What made this meet so cool is there were no hills and everyone could go for a personal record.”

Heflin added that, naturally, some runners are very strong but not fast on flat courses. Those runners do well on a course like the one at Frogtown. However, he added, the ones that “can just hit the accelerator” did great on the flat course. This was a large meet with all divisions competing.

The frosh/soph girls placed sixth on a 2.25 mile course with Kim Abney leading the way at 16:28. She was followed by Jill Junqueiro 17:22, Belen Luchuga-Soto 17:25, Rachel Farley 17:38, Marian Peralta 17:44, Gorette Coelho 17:48, Molly Terpstra 18:00.

Frosh/soph boys placed 13th with Jacen Peoples 14:12, TJ McNeil 14:20, Josh Churchill 15:26, Ben Millard 15:32, Juan Diego Sanchez 15:33, Cadon Crumbley 16:03, Josh Schut 16:47.

Varsity girls placed 13th with Carla Cardova leading the way at 24:31 followed by Alejandra Jimenez-Garcia 24:34, Kriseya Deleon 26:33, Rachel Lau 27:26, Julie Avila 28:39.

“Kaitlyn Baptista and Brianna Cerceda were also in the top seven,” said Heflin “The varsity boys placed 17th and Josh Corrales led the group with 19:19.”

He was followed by Moises Grajeda-Padilla 19:21, David Plascencia 19:32, Gino Stern 19:37, Ryan Belletto 20:11. Alvaro Desni and Dylan Booth made the top seven for the team.

It was a sixth place overall showing for the JV boys with Miguel Marmol leading at 19:51, Logan Mendes 20:10, Aiden Narayan 20:14, Connor Lambeth 20:19, Alex Velazquez 20:21, Manny Diaz 20:23, and Dylan Criteser.

“What is great about the varsity boys and JV boys placements is the we moved our top JV boys up to varsity since you have to run a varsity before you can run a JV team,” said Heflin. “I think they did awesome and most set a new PR by over a minute.”

This week the cross country team takes the varsity boys and three girls to Mt. SAC, which is one of the largest events in the country.