Moapa X-Country Teams Take First Place In Pre-Regional Meet

By IAIN MCMURRAY

The Progress

The Moapa Valley High School Cross Country teams continued their season last Saturday, October 9, at the Lake Mead Pre-Regionals held at Veterans Memorial Park in Boulder City.

The Pirates took first place in both the Varsity Mens and Womens Small School divisions and second in the Varsity B Mens race.

The Varsity Boys Small Schools race was led by Amplus Academy runner Beckett Melver with a time of 17:13. He was tailed by Pirates Cyrus Katich in second place and Marcus Shambaugh in third with times of 17:20 and 17:31, respectively. Other Pirate runners included Joseph Boss with a time of 18:30, Kayden Dixon at 18:31, and Jedidiah Stephens at 19:22. This gave the Pirates a total score of 29, ten points ahead of second place Amplus Academy.

The Varsity Girls Small Schools race was next. It was led by Pirate runner Emma Humes, who clocked in at 19:44.

VVHS senior Kelly Denninghoff took third place in this race with a time of 21:20.5.

Other Pirate runners included Linn Engelgren (21:54) in fifth, Kenzie Hughes (23:04) in sixth, Sasha Barnes (24:20) and Beverly Potts (26:08).

Due to other teams not having full rosters and thus not being counted in the point tally, the Moapa team received a perfect score of 15.

“We have a lot of strong runners this year and I’m glad they pulled through this race!” said Pirate runner Kenzie Hughes. “Everyone tried their best, and I’m glad to see it paid off!”

Next up was the Varsity B Mens race, where Shadow Ridge runner Carson Wetzel led with a time of 18:41. Pirate runners included Joseph Barnes in fourth (19:11), William Anderson in sixth (19:38), Gavin Hendricks (19:40), Noah Christensen (19:54), Cash Keller (20:29), Nicholas Leavitt (20:40), Russell Hardy (21:03), Braxton Farley (21:48), Logan Harris (21:50), and Grant Muhlestein (21:57). Also running were Isaac Thompson (22:08), Stockton Humes (22:34), Christopher Houston (24:01), and Iain McMurray (25:01).

The Pirates will be competing again next week at the Bud O’dea Frosh-Soph Championship and the SNTCCCA Invitational.