Cross country: CdM girls look for strong finish
A woman approached Corona del Mar High cross country coach Bill Sumner last Saturday morning at Mt. San Antonio College, asking him where the finish line was at the CIF Southern Section Championships.
Sumner stood about 100 feet from the clearly marked finish line. He pointed the woman in the right direction by saying, “Right there, that’s what it says.”
“Oh OK, I just wanted to make sure,” the woman said, a bit flustered.
“Don’t get mad at me,” Sumner responded with a grin. “I was just kidding.”
Sumner, of course, knows the course at Mt. SAC like the back of his hand. The same is true of Fresno’s Woodward Park for Sumner — but not for his runners.
Sumner led CdM to 22 straight appearances there, a streak that was snapped two years ago. But the CdM girls are back in Fresno on Saturday for the first time since 2011, to compete in the CIF State Championships. CdM will compete in the Division 3 girls’ race at 10:05 a.m. The Sea Kings squeaked in, finishing seventh in Division 3 at Mt. SAC to grab the final qualifying spot.
Two Newport-Mesa individuals will also compete. Sage Hill School sophomore Julia Lowe, who finished fourth at CIF finals, is in the Division 5 girls’ race at 11:10 a.m. Costa Mesa senior Anuare Magana, who placed eighth at CIF finals, is in the Division 4 boys’ race at 10:40 a.m.
CdM’s girls have won seven state cross country titles, the last one coming in 2009. This year, Sumner said another top-seven finish at state is a realistic goal for the CdM girls, who are ranked tied for 10th in the latest state Division 3 rankings by PrepCalTrack.com. The Sea Kings are led by their three senior captains, Tess St. Geme, Kirsten Hansen and Elin Wolker, and rely on a balanced team effort.
Hansen is the only CdM runner to previously race at Woodward Park, as she made state with CdM as a freshman. St. Geme has stepped up recently and finished as the top CdM runner at both CIF-SS Division 3 preliminaries and finals, where she finished 24th in 18 minutes, 42 seconds.
Other runners for CdM include junior Lily Schmidt, sophomore Raquel Powers, junior Jacqueline Choe, junior Hannah Crane and senior Emily Meckler. Schmidt just returned last weekend from a stress fracture injury.
Magana and Lowe are also hoping for a good finish to their season at the state meet. Magana, the first Costa Mesa boys’ runner to make state since Bruce Hancock in 1998, set a personal-record time of 15:33 last weekend at CIF finals.
