Jesuit/Davis Jamboree predicts future improvements and wins

By Jeanne Kim,
BlueDevilHUB.com Staff–

Davis High’s cross-country team continued to pursue another strong season with impressive results at the Jesuit/Davis Jamboree at Granite Regional Park on Saturday, Sept. 10, with senior varsity runner Michael Vernau coming in first place on the five kilometer course with a time of 14:52.4.

The men’s varsity team placed fourth overall and Vernau is confident that the team will continue to improve.

“I think our varsity team will continue to improve every week, and it will be a tough battle for states but hopefully they can pull through,” Vernau said.

Coach Bill Gregg agrees, and foresees a great season ahead.

“So I think we are on track for a great season and probably the biggest, I don’t want to say challenge, but the mountain to climb is going to be for varsity boys, but they are already one step closer to the summit in just in two weeks and they are going to be on a mission to be one of the top teams in the section,” Gregg said.

Although missing key teammates seniors Sofia Castiglioni and Abigail Fisk and sophomores Charlotte Mitchell and Aniela Mitchell, the women’s varsity team placed second overall with junior Olivia O’Keeffe placing third overall with a time of 16:54.5, followed by sophomore Sophia Lodigiani placing sixth with a time of 17:14.1.

Although the women’s varsity was supposed to run the same 5k course as the men’s, the lead biker erred and took them on a shorter, 2.9 mile course instead.

O’Keeffe was satisfied with her first race of the season, but she hopes to continue to work hard and get better throughout the season.

“It was pretty good for my first one, I didn’t feel great but I was happy with the result,” O’Keeffe said. “I’d like to run around 17:40 at the state meet course. I did 17:52 last year so that would be nice to do that.”

The women’s frosh/soph and open teams both conquered first place, with the men’s open coming in second place and the men’s frosh/soph team placing fourth.

Coach Gregg was pleased with the runners’ efforts and praised the solidity of all the teams.

“I saw a nice progression from last week; varsity boys in particular did a great job. Varsity girls were missing four of the seven for the ACT test and for soccer, but they ran really solid as well. Frosh/soph won convincingly and without Lily Byrne who was our number one runner last week, so they looked fabulous and even in the open races we looked super strong and super deep,” Gregg said.

Assistant coach Tim Groth agreed.

“Top to bottom, we had a lot of impressive PRs. Every week we are trying to get better as we get closer to the post-season in November.”