Milton High School teams place first or second at Early Bird/Bob Blastow Invite
By Coach Andy Carr, Whitesburg, GA, 8/27/16
The cross country teams at Milton High School traveled to the always fast Early Bird/Bob Blastow Invite hosted by Alexander HS and came away with wins in the Varsity Boys, JV Girls & the Open girls races and runner-ups in the Varsity Girls, JV Boys & Open boys events.
Varsity Boys
On the always fast layout, Milton (1st-52 pts) dispatched 27 scoring schools to claim the team victory. Region foe South Forsyth (2nd-72 pts) & Pope (3rd-83 pts) trailed. Fast was the word of the day as junior Sam Bowers (1st-15:36) became the 2nd-fastest performer in Milton school history with his overall victory. Bowers has yet to lose a race this season. Becoming a new member of the top-10 all time performers club, junior Michael Malkowski (3rd-16:08) was in the lead chase group the entire race. Fellow junior Ryan Beitzell’s new personal best (8th-16:26) help put three Eagle finishers in the top-10 to lead the team. Also recording personal bests were seniors Valera Stettner (15th-16:35) & Joey Brovont (25th-16:52). Also running varsity & turning in personal best times included juniors Cam Harman (33rd-17:03), Andrew Blizzard (43rd-17:17), Dru Milton (46th-17:18) & senior Jake Vernon (59th-17:40). There were 242 finishers.
Varsity Girls
The Lady Eagles followed suit with many personal best times and a top-10 all time performance to fall just short of winning the team battle with region rival South Forsyth (1st-61 pts). Milton (2nd-79 pts) kept the race close the entire contest but the up-front strength of South Forsyth proved too much for the Lady Eagles to overcome. Senior captain Marie Repasy (3rd-18:39) became the number two all-time performer with her 22 second personal best time. Repasy started out conservatively and moved through the field to challenge for 2nd place in the last few meters of the race. Behind Repasy, Milton put three more finishers in the top-16 to solidify the runner-up spot over 20 other scoring schools. Leading this group was freshman Abby Rindt (12th-19:35) and was followed by sophomore Taylor Cushman (14th-19:44) & senior Brooke Aumer (16th-19:46). Junior Emily Bowers (34th-20:22) closed out the Lady Eagle scoring. Sophomore Faith Wagner (39th-20:45), junior Jessie Barnes (56th-21:12), and sophomores Maddie Erbey (21:43) & Sam Lenox (96th-22:04) concluded the Milton effort in a race that had 198 finishers.
JV Boys
Milton (2nd-89 pts) ran into the very strong group from South Forsyth (1st-21 pts) to gather runner-up honors. Seniors Paul Rose (11th-18:11) & Pierce Baker (13th-18:18) led the Eagle effort besting 33 schools! 242 finishers were recorded.
JV Girls
The Lady Eagles (1st-82 pts) held on for a very close team win over Harrison (2nd-86 pts) & bested a total of 29 schools! Freshman Kelly Scott (6th-22:06) & senior Fernanda Bonilla (12th-22:37) were Milton’s top finishers out of 200 runners.
Open Races
Milton’s girls (1st) & Boys (2nd) competed well in the last and largest race of the day (844 finishers) led by junior Mary Grace Coyle (2nd-23:01) & senior Lincoln Tady (6th-18:53).
