Moments after crossing the finish line Saturday morning in Buffalo Park, having easily won the girls varsity race of the Four Corners Invitational, Flagstaff High’s Taylor Biggambler collapsed into the arms of medical personnel.
Not to worry. In fact, Biggambler recovered quickly and soon was chatting with teammates, as the Eagle girls celebrated a dominant victory in the meet, coming off a win two weeks ago at the Peaks Invite.
But Biggambler’s all-out effort showed that she wasn’t taking the opposition lightly and was pushing hard to achieve a fast time. In that respect, she succeeded, running 18:25 to beat teammate Oliva Baker by nearly a half a minute. But it wasn’t quite the performance Biggambler, a junior, had hoped coming in.
“I was hoping for something under 18, but it’s fine; I still did really good,” Biggambler said. “My goal before the race was to stick with the Chinle girl (Janessa Segay, who finished third). I’ve been hearing about her. I tried to pace off of her. But when I came up the hill, I thought, ‘Wow, I could hold this (pace) for a while.’ I was going pretty fast and thought if I could keep it I’d break 18. I was hoping for the best.”
Biggambler’s finish was just the start of Flagstaff’s dominance. Baker, a senior, overtook Segay in the last mile to finish second. After Coconino’s Mary McGinlay took fourth and Buena’s Abby Roark fifth, the Eagles’ impressive freshmen duo of Kylyn Taylor and Rylan Swain placed sixth and seventh, Taylor running 20 minutes flat and Swain 20:12. Flagstaff’s all-important (for scoring) fifth runner, Naomi Ketter, was 13th in 20:48, giving the Eagles 23 points for the meet.
Coconino’s girls finished second with 93 points, led by McGinlay and Savanna McKerracher in 17th at 21:09. Chinle was third with 100. Basis Flagstaff did not field enough runners for team scoring, but junior Sammy Mullaney was the Yeti’s top finisher in 14th in 20:53.
“We’re feeling great about our team,” Biggambler said. “It’s like we have little partners. Me and Olivia, Kylyn and Rylan and Naomi and Miley (McQuivey). It’s pretty cool. We’re excited for state.”
Coconino ran its fourth meet of the young season and had perhaps its best performance. Actually, it was only the third meet for McGinlay, who skipped last week’s race, the Canyon de Chelly Invite, to run the Imogene Pass Run in Colorado, a grueling trail race in Colorado that is popular with Flagstaff runners.
“I felt pretty good today,” McGinlay said, asked about post-Imogene stress. “I tried to take it easier and recover well during the week. And they shortened the course for Imogene (from 17.1 to 14.2) so that helped. Today, I wanted to stay with Olivia. She’s a good person to pace. I saw she caught the Chinle girl and the end, so that was amazing to watch.”
In the boys race, Flagstaff also easily came away with the victory, and defending state champion Alex Bland (15:50) won the individual title, after placing third two weeks ago at the Peaks Invite.
Four of the top five runners were from Flagstaff, with senior Cole Troxler placing second in 15:56, Elijah Talkalai fourth in 16:28 and Uuts Masayumptewa fifth in 16:31. The Eagles had to wait a while for their fifth finisher, Miles Borling in 33rd in 17:48, but they still won going away with 44 points to Arizona Prep’s 82.
Bland executed a near-perfect race. He held back in the early going, sticking with the early leader, Conor McGlynn of Desert Mountain. But on the sharp left turn in the second mile, leading to the last big loop, Bland made his move, opening up a five meter lead on McGlynn that soon became quite a gap.
“I wanted to make my move up that shallow hill and then hold on until I hit the finish,” Bland said. “I was worried a long time about (McGlynn) but once we got on the straightaway, I felt more confident.”
Troxler was pleased with his second-place finish in what he called a return to form.
“I felt really good today, like my old self again,” Troxler said. “I don’t know. After I had a really good freshman year, I fell off after that. I don’t know (why). I wasn’t training quite right, and I had some new allergies to deal with. I feel like this year will probably be my comeback.”
Coconino’s Laine Davis was seventh overall in 16:47, perhaps his best showing of the season. Teammate Clayton Rhoton was close behind in ninth in 16:56, as the Panthers finished fifth as a team.
“I was hoping to get a few places higher, top five, but a few guys just kicked better,” Davis said. “It was different, because we’ve never done this course before. For Peaks, we don’t do that short cut we did today and today we didn’t do that second hill. There were a couple of different turns we had to deal with today.”
It was the Panthers’ fourth meet this season, and both Davis and Rhoton said the boys team is getting sharper and race-savvy.
“Our team is a lot more prepared than either of us was expecting,” Davis said. “From what we hear, Flag High does more intense workouts than we do, so we replace that with more meets.”
The third local team, Basis Flagstaff, finished 11th as a team, with senior Ben Hutchinson (who also ran Imogene last weekend) the top finisher in 28th place in 17:42.
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