It's all in the timing - or not!

By TYLER WARNER

Rarely in high school sports do teams get a chance to have a preseason where they can practice all the techniques and strategies they learned during summer.

Even rarer is the opportunity to have a pre-season in the middle of the season. With the cancellation of the annual Silverwood Coaster Cross meet, Coeur d’Alene High School stepped up to host a “jamboree” meet Sept. 6 where no times were kept, no team scores were given and no awards distributed.

For the Badger cross country teams, this allowed an opportunity for novice and veteran runners to practice the strategies they’ve learned.

This was also the first chance for the Badgers to see how they stacked up against IML rival Priest River. The girls raced first on the three-mile course at Hayden Canyon. The course featured a variety of terrain which included hills, wide turns, tight turns, flat stretches, gravel surfaces, as well as trails. Other teams at the meet were Lakeland and Coeur d’Alene High School.

Just as the Seattle Seahawks have Marshawn Lynch, nicknamed “Beast Mode” for his clutch plays and hard running, the Lady Badgers may have found a strong runner to lead them this season.

Sophomore Nicole Donn, a first year runner, finished in 23:16, dropping three minutes off her time last week. Perhaps most importantly, she was the first Lady Badger to finish and was the top 3A and IML finisher. Following Donn were Victoria Smith (26:05), Hannah Lysne (26:22), Makailah Dowell (26:32), and Amanda Bauer (26:53). The entire Lady Badger team finished before Priest River’s second runner came in.

The BFHS coaches were excited to see the girls perform well. While this early season performance was a good indicator of things to come, the season is still young and the only race that determines who goes to state is Districts.

“The girls did a great job,” said assistant Mike Tymrak, “but now Priest River knows what we can do. We’ll have to continue to work hard to have a chance in late October.”

The boys used the race to figure out the varsity and JV positions for their next race. Jacob Perkins led the way, finishing in 17:32. He started out leading the race, but fell off the main pack and yet managed to stay in the top 5. “I started out going too fast,” said Perkins. “That’s something I can work on for next week—finding my pace.”

Alva Swanson, after a great year of summer training, posted a solid 19:06. He hopes to drop into the 18 minute mark at Kellogg on Thursday. Senior Tucker Cavender came in at 19:50, followed by Nolan Stidham at 20:19. First year runner, junior Jack Wade, finished in 20:33. Rounding out the new varsity runners were Eric Ellis at 20:35 and Freshman Dawson Thomas at 21:26.

Landing on the junior varsity squad this week were freshmen Neil Martin (21:33), Will Colson (24:24), Nick Magdaleno (24:15), and Andrew McCoy (28:38). Sophomore Alex Urbaniak finished in 25:10.

With hard work and good races, any of these boys could easily jump up and take varsity positions. Coaches like the depth they have, especially in the young runners. If these freshmen and sophomores continue to work hard and continue cross country, in a couple of years the Badger boys will be primed for great seasons in the future.

The Badgers next meets will be at Pinehurst Golf Course for the Kellogg invite Sept. 11 at 4 p.m. and back at Hayden Canyon on Sept. 13 for the Super 1 invitational starting at 10 a.m. From here on out, the Badgers will race for hardware.

— Warner is the cross country head coach.