Skyline had a great day at the 5A State Cross Country meet on November 18th, as Shalaya Kipp won the girls and Steven Clark won the boys individual titles.

The 5A girls race was absolutely the race of the day.  Kipp was not very well known around the state going in and was not considered to be a contender for the Championship.  She managed to stick to the front pack throughout the race, though, until she and pre-race favorite Kim Quinn of Bingham pulled ahead of the others.  As they entered the stadium, Kim Quinn extended her small lead and it looked like Kipp would finish as runner-up.  In an incredible display of strength and speed, however, Shalaya found another gear and caught Quinn at the finish line in a classic photo finish.  The judges conferred and declared Shalaya the winner.

The boys 5A race was nearly as exciting.  Jared Ward of Davis and Stephen Clark had established themselves throughout the season as the top two runners in 5A.  In every head to head meeting, however, Ward had prevailed.  This time Clark followed his race plan to perfection, running behind Ward until near the finish, waiting to turn on his superior speed.  Nearly 100 meters from the finish line Clark seemed almost to blast off a launching pad, sweeping by Ward and leaving him wondering what happened.  Clark ended up winning by over 7 seconds.

In team scoring the youthful Skyline teams performed well.  The girls finished in 8th place as Taylor Berhow, Rachel Webb, Brynne Davis and Megan Combe followed Kipp in scoring for the Eagles.  The boys team had a similar finish as they took 9th place.  Scoring for Skyline in addition to Clark were Morgan Empey, Thatcher Olson, Ben Taylor and Isaac Hales.  Both teams will have all their top runners return next year. 

Here’s to winning two team trophies next year to go with this year’s individual titles!

Check back soon for photos from the State and Region championships!

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 19th, 2006 at 5:50 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.