No Surprises this Year, Blake is 4A Favorite
Nov 19, 2010
Bridget Blake has never been one to run without confidence. But even she admits that her time at last year’s Class 4A state championship was a bit of a surprise. She was hoping for a good finish, but she stayed with the pack and picked up a second-place, just 17 seconds behind champion Shelby Hayes of Winter Park. This year will be different though; the sophomore from Dr. Phillips will enter the 4A State Meet as the favorite.
Durant High senior Grace VanDeGrift had an interesting twist to her first introduction to competitive running. After a wrong turn during her first 5K race, the 11-years-old ended up completing the 10K course instead. That same toughness carries over to today, when after an 18:05 regional championship she is among the favorites to contend for the 3A State Championship tomorrow at Little Everglades Ranch in Dade City. Oh... and she just announced her college choice: another baby Gator!
The pain was excruciating, but Phil Duncan kept on going. He was limited to 15 miles a week to train and he was frustrated. He kept going, taking the turns with care and gritting every time he had to put in a late kick.
In Florida cross country, Class 4A-Region 2 is known as the "Region of Death." Six of the top 10 times in the state of Florida came out of the region which includes Dr. Phillips, Tampa Plant, Sarasota Riverview, St. Petersburg, Colonial, and Boone. The competition is fierce and it showed at the region finals on Friday at Lake Park in Tampa on Friday. In the boys race, the top 13 finishers broke 16:00 over a tight and winding terrain.
Grace Vandegrift and Max Del Monte earned victories yesterday at the Ryan McCall Invitational at the Sydney Trails in Dover (just outside of Brandon). It's great to see Vandegrift back in action this season! She was solo basically from start-to-finish. Del Monte had company for about a mile before separating from the pack and earning a sub-16 time on the relatively difficult course. Jeff (Adams) and Jeff (Berlinicke) were on-site for flrunners.com at the meet. Meet summary and results are now posted and hundreds of photos will be uploaded by the end of the day.
Del Monte is dominating the Tampa cross country scene, but he can hear the footsteps of his teammate Jake Covington, who is pushing him to the limit. The hard-working junior pounded the pavement all summer, hitting 80 mile week regularly.
Estero's Erick Montoya battled to the line against Eric Larson in the 3200 meters at the 3A State Meet last month. In the end, he came up just short but his time of 9:23.42 would have won any other classification. As much as the loss hurt, Montoya was pleased with his 17 second PR.
Jeffrey Demps knows that the big money might be in football, but for a couple of days in April, his mind was far away from the gridiron.