The Piedmont High School girls cross country team was edged out of third place by the tiniest of margins at the Ed Sias Invitational on Sept. 13 at Hidden Valley Park in Martinez.
The Highlanders tied Las Lomas for third with 139 points but the tie-breaker is how your sixth runner finished (normally only the top five score). Piedmont’s Nikita Gorelik crossed the finish line in the Small Schools race 51st overall (48th for scoring purposes) in 14 minutes, 13.1 seconds on the two-mile course. That was two places behind the Knights Clara Araujo (14:11.5).
Leighton Mand was the Highlanders top finisher, taking 19th in 13:15.0. Skylar Best was 29th in 13:29.4. Amalia Gray and Viviane Oesterer came in back-to-back with Gray 33rd in 13:43.2 and Oesterer next in 13:45.8. Cora Brozowski Schrader was 38th in 13:52.5.
Coach Steve Zirkelbach pointed out there were just 38 seconds between the first and fifth Piedmont runner. “Once again the close distance between the first and fifth runner continues to be their strength,” he said.
Carondelet’s Gretchen Yakaitis was the top finisher in 12:00.7 while Northgate took the team title with 40 points.
The boys team, already down Sebastien Swain, who is recovering from surgery, were missing two more top runners: Noah Sohn and Alex Schleuning. Still, the Highlanders came through with an 11th-place finish. Ian Chung was the top finisher in 56th in 11:31.0 followed immediately by Aaron Bennett (11:31.3). Dylan Wallway was 66th in 11:42.9. Devon Thai came home 73rd in 11:50.9 with Luca LaForte in 102nd in 12:33.6.
Campolindo’s Caden Ehrhorn won the individual race in 10:14.2 while St. Mary’s-Albany was the team champion with 54 points.