The most formidable distance meet in Northern California will be a bit different this year due to Covid. Tomorrow's meet will feature athletes from three counties, Alameda, San Mateo, and Santa Clara.
Although this will be the smallest DDF in many years, the talent pool will still be outstanding and we should still have some great competition.
Below I will attempt to highlight some of the top athletes in the meet.
Girls 800
This will be a potential West Bay Athletic League preview with the top four athletes in this field hailing from the WBAL and more specifically two schools. The fastest entry belongs to SHP senior Luci Lambert who was outstanding during the just-completed XC season. Her official HS PR is 2:19.75 but she is capable of running faster. Her main competition will come from Castilleja sophomore Samira Kennedy. She ran 2:15.56 at last year's Rustbuster Invitational. The other two athletes who will be in the hunt will be Sacred Heart Prep junior Lucy Paynter and Castilleja sophomore, Daniella Henderson.
Boys 800
The top two entries in this field will be El Camino junior Yutaka Roberts (1:56.37) and Archbishop Mitty Taylor Iden. Roberts ran his time as an impressive frosh while racing at the CCS Final. Two other athletes that will also contend are the two Bellarmine runners, Tristan Lalonde and Jack Glanville.
Girls 1600
Lambert is entered in this race as well and has the fastest entry time here. She had an outstanding freshman season qualifying to the CCS final and will have a great opportunity to dip under the 5-minute mark officially in her HS career. Her main competition should come from Albany junior, Sophia Nordenholz who will also be after a PR here near the 5-minute range. El Camino junior Noelle Diep will also be in the mix and will not be afraid to go out with the leaders and challenge them for the lead.
Boys 1600
The competition here should be between a herd of Bellarmine runners and one Woodside runner. The Bell crew will include Daniel Vaca, Ryunosuke Yanashita, Ben Callon, Casper Aliaga and Aiden Theocheung. Casey Orton of Woodside should be ready to run in the low 4:20s and see about defeating the already mentioned runners.
Girls 3200
A lot of the entries include athletes entered in multiple events. Both Sophia Nordenholz and Noelle Diep are entered in the 1600 as well as this event. They will both be after fast times here as well as a victory if they double back to this event. Woodside junior Elle Marsyla as well as Mircea Kippes of Adrian Wilcox will attempt to keep up with the leaders in search of a fast time.
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Boys 3200
This will be the main event of the meet featuring three of the fastest runners in California. Bellarmine seniors Colin Peattie, Nolan Topper, and Galen Topper are all capable of running in the low 9s and perhaps even dip under. In the history of the sport, there have been two schools that have had 3 athletes run faster than 9 minutes in this event so we may be watching history tomorrow. I will certainly be rooting for them.