* Rylee Blade, a junior from Santiago Corona, was third at the CIF Division I state championships in 2022
Photo Credit: Raymond Tran/Milesplit
- - -
Rylee Blade grabbed her second straight victory in consecutive years on Saturday at the Cool Breeze Invitational, securing an easy win of 16:30.00 in the Sundown Showdown race at the Pomona Fairplex course over three miles as she outpaced the rest of the field by nearly a minute.
Perhaps that was not surprising out of Blade, who is the defending CIF Outdoor 3,200m champion, but it certainly was a statement.
The performance was third-best all-time on the course, only trailing Sadie Engelhardt's record run of 15:59.90 from 2021 and Dalia Frias' effort in that same race in 16:01.10.
Blade, a junior, still has one more shot at the course record next year.
She secured the victory by 54 seconds, defeating JSerra Catholic's Summer Wilson, who finished in 17:24, and helped Santiago Corona to a second-place finish overall with 101 points.
Wilson's JSerra Catholic, however, won the overall team title with 43 points, planting five runners inside the top 17 placements. Claremont was third with 150 points.
Santa Monica's Phoebe Benun was third overall in 17:41.4, while Clovis West's Cameron Macias was fourth in 17:42.7 and JSerra Catholic's Kaylah Tasser was fifth in 17:44.0.
JSerra Catholic put down a big statement in the victory, as its first three were under 18 minutes for three miles and its top five were all under 18:20.
Related Links: