All-State Cooper Lennox & Emma Fashant Among Today's Racers

PREVIEW

Windom Invite 

Location: Windom Golf Course, Windom

Weather: 75 degrees, 50% chance of thunderstorms

BOYS

Virtual Meet Projection: Mountain Lake/Comfrey (43.5), Windom Area (54)

Top Individuals: Dalton Piotter (Mountain Lake, 16:53), Mitchell Buerkle (Springfield/Cedar Mountain, 17:14), Ryan Blomgren (Mountain Lake, 17:30), Elijah Kirschstein (Springfield/Cedar Mountain, 17:40), Gil Parent (Windom, 17:56)

The Skinny: The meet today will be a bit of a Section 3A preview with Mountain Lake and Windom the two teams battling for the win. Mountain Lake placed second at the section championships last year and advanced to the State Meet. They had two of their top five runners graduate so it will be more challenging to finish in the top two spots this year. Mountain Lake has beaten Windom twice this year, once even with some of their top runners sitting out. Dalton Piotter has started his season with a personal best and three runner up finishes. This race could be the one to break that second place streak, however, he will have to compete against Mitchell Buerkle. Neither of the two have an individual cross country title so the race is on to who grabs their first title.

GIRLS

Virtual Meet Projection: Lake Crystal-Wellcome Memorial/Nicollet (50), Southwest Minnesota Christian (92)

Top Individuals: Makenna Thurston (LCWMN, 18:54), Olivia Flack (LCWMN, 20:29), Moriah Bullerman (Adrian, 20:39), Abigail Hagen (SESMNUC, 20:44), Grace Moeller (LCWMN, 20:47)

The Skinny: Makenna Thurston and her team from Lake Crystal-Wellcome Memorial will lead the girls team and individual races. Thurston is currently ranked sixth in Class A and finished in that place at the 2017 state championships. She has only lost to two Class A runners this year, Morgan Gehl and Tenley Nelson. So far, Thurston has matched her finishing places as each of the meets as last year, but her times have been much faster at each respective course. She won this meet by one minute and 20 seconds last year and another dominating performance looks to be happening today. Her team looks to follow her performances and grab the team title.

(written by Emma Benner)