Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Ruybalid wins boys race at Highland Invite

Tiger and Jaguar teams to compete at Santa Fe meet

John Gale News-Bulletin Staff Writer; jgale@news-bulletin.com

After three straight meets in which all three Valencia County cross country teams competed at the same meet, Los Lunas and Valencia ventured to a large meet this past weekend.

The Tigers and Jaguars competed at the Highland Invitational at Bullhead Park in Albuquerque on Friday, with Jonah Ruybalid of LLHS winning the boys race.

Los Lunas

Ruybalid won the boys varsity race at the Highland meet with a time of 15:52, his first sub-16-minute time of his career. Ruybalid was five seconds faster than Cibola's Chris Montoya.

It was his second win in a row, though this one came over a stronger field than last week's victory on his home track in a meet that featured just the three Valencia County schools.

"Jonah won the race, which was really, really impressive," Los Lunas coach Larry Padilla said. "Right now, Jonah seems to be right up there to be in the top three spots at the state meet if he can stay healthy."

Ruybalid's victory helped the Tiger boys get a team score of 114, which placed them fifth in the meet behind Cibola, Sandia, Hobbs and La Cueva.

Patrick and Justin Lueras took 10th and 22nd, respectively, Andrew Lovato crossed 38th a and William Kessler was 43rd. Brandon Morgan, who was 44th, and Marty Gomez, who was 56th , didn't factor in the team score.

"We were kind of expecting to finish fifth," Padilla said. "We had not run against Hobbs and La Cueva. We were pretty close to La Cueva, a lot closer than I thought we would be. I was real pleased with the way the boys did."

Los Lunas' girls finished third with a 99, behind La Cueva and Sandia. Kendra Lente was the top Lady Tiger finisher, taking eighth.

Eliya Lucero was 12th, Mateja and Tori Rye finished 16th and 32nd, respectively, Aikiko Herrera crossed 33rd. Also competing, but not factoring into the team score, were Allison Casias (38th) and Kelly Chavez (42nd).

"Our girls took third, which I thought was pretty impressive with the schools there," Padilla said. "Both teams beat Highland, Manzano and Rio Grande. That gives us a good idea of how we'll do at district. It looks like Eldorado's ahead of us, but we're right behind for both teams."

Los Lunas will travel to the Capital Invite for its next meet on Saturday. The Santa Fe-area meet starts at 9 a.m.

Valencia

Grace Vickers led Valencia with the best finish for any Jaguar runner, taking 24th individually in the girls varsity race. The girls finished ninth, as they had a team score of 219.

Tracie Higdon was 41st, Jordan Koontz crossed 50th, Nisa Rascon placed 55th, Chellen Chavez took 64th.

Maria Rascon's finish wasn't part of the five-person team score, but she wasn't far behind Chavez, placing 67th.

The Valencia boys had a 290 to finish 10th, with Mike Bonilla leading the Jaguars with his 42nd-place finish.

Their six other runners all finished over a 54-second stretch, as Alejandro Macias, Justin Driskell, Chris Galemore, Raymond Sandoval, Marc Gutierrez and Marcos Tafoya finished between 60th and 66th.

"The kids did well," Valencia coach Lynette Padilla said. "The course was fast, and the competition was extremely tough. We'll keep working on improving our pack time and racing consistently."

Valencia will also be competing at the Jaguar Invite, hosted by Capital High School, on Saturday.

Both Larry and Lynette Padilla said their teams have not run on the course before, but are looking forward to a good competition.

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