On October 2nd, The Wildcats arrived and competed for the 15th time at the Leavenworth Invitational against 17 other teams. This meet only had 3 race categories with JV and Varsity Girls combined, Varsity Boys and JV Boys.

The Wildcats blazed through the races, placing 2nd on both the Varsity Boys race and JV/Varsity Girls with an honorary 1st place on the JV Boys race in terms of team scoring.

The top Wildcat runner, Senior Julian Ramos, ran an impressive pace placing 6th in the Varsity Boys race and clocking 16:11. Other impressive finishes include Senior Brandon Black placing 1st place within the JV Boys race followed by Freshman Cohen Davis, making 3rd place with 18:01, only 4 seconds slower than Brandon’s 17:57. Notable finishes in the Girl’s race include Hannah Mikkelsen’s 19:41, placing her 5th and Whitley Hill’s 20:07, placing her 7th.

The course, which was 2.8 miles, went through extreme elevations with difficult switchbacks, downhills and climbs.

 “You’re climbing or descending the entire time, the footing is often challenging, there are a few tight turns that are banked the wrong way, and there is a grinder of a hill that you start on, run up to begin the second lap and then finish on,” stated Assistant XC Coach Mark Wavra. 

The Eastmont athletes had trained hard for this meet due to the difficulty imposed by the Leavenworth course. Because of this, the Wildcats were able to cruise through and place high on team scores on both boys and girls races against 17 other teams. 

“The only way we could have done any better would have been with fresh legs. We trained really hard all week and did not really give much of a break for recovery before the race. That is part of what made our performance on Saturday so impressive,“ explained Assistant XC Coach Tanja Medrano. 

Check out the Wildcats at the next XC meet at Lakewood HS, with more than 3,000 athletes on October 9th.