What to expect at the meet

With our new cross country course doubling back on itself so many times and 4 races starting 15 minutes apart things could get a little confusing. At any moment there will be 2 races going on at the same time. In our races we'll be competing against both Madison and Christian. Neither of these teams pose a threat to either our boys or girls teams. However there will be two other schools in our races, Hoover and Kearny. Expect Hoover's Mulugeta Engdaw to lead wire-to-wire. At the Mt. Carmel meet he placed 6th in the small school junior boys race in 10:45 over 2.08 miles... about 5:10 mile pace. They also have a couple of other guys who will be in the mix with our top runners. Their girls team doesn't appear to have any outstanding runners with their best behind our top 7. Kearny has yet to run a race this season and has a small team, both boys and girls. Bottom line, expect the girls race to be dominated by Coronado and the boys led by the Hoover kid with a bit of competition for our guys behind him.

In the other races (Clairemont, Crawford, San Diego, Mission Bay, Lincoln) our top league rival Clairemont will have no problem in the girls race so they may just elect to use it as a workout. In the boys race, however, San Diego has a bunch of guys who can run under 18 minutes for 5k, Clairemont  can't beat San Diego but it'll be interesting to see how fast the Clairemont boys run, faced with that type of competition. Clairemont has a guy who can probably run 16 minutes or better for 5k, another who can crack 17, and a couple of sub 19 guys. Hopefully after tomorrow I'll know how we stack-up against them.

Best places to watch the race.
Look a the map below.. if you stand at Point A you can watch the runners head down to the dog loop after the start and come back after the 1st half mile. Then stay there or stroll over to B to see them return after the 1st mile. Then walk across the street to C where they'll pass by two more times during the 3rd mile. Finally stroll back across the street to the finish line to watch them there.