The first cross country meet held on the new course at the New Franklin high school had an exciting finish when Bulldog junior Douglass Creason and Brunswick’s Gus Kussman approached the finish line neck and neck in a dead sprint for first place.  

“I was kind of behind him for most of the race and towards the end I was like, ‘I want to get him, I want to get first.’ I got up to him and lost the sprint off by half an inch,” Creason said.

Creason finished second with a time of 22:04 on the demanding course.

"We were very excited to host our meet on a new course this year,” said New Franklin coach Adam Quest. 

“Our staff has put a lot of work into developing a trail through the woods behind the school, and we were able to utilize our city park to develop a very challenging course for the runners.”

Glasgow’s KatiJo Schaefer led the area girls with a second-place finish of 24:45, just four seconds behind the first-place finisher, Kendra Zeilstra of Brunswick.

New Franklin’s Mallori Burnett was less than 20 seconds behind the leader, finishing fourth.

“I felt a lot better on my second lap,” Burnett said. “I stayed with that Glasgow girl pretty much the whole time until right at the end.”

 Burnett ran a time of 24:49 and finished nearly two minutes ahead of the fifth-place runner.

“Mallori ran an outstanding race,” Quest said. “She has been having a wonderful season so far and has been running some of her better times of the last several years.  She ran strong on a tough course.”

Hailey Derboven led Higbee with a fifth-place finish of 26:47, and Kylleen Gibson was two seconds behind in sixth.

Colton Sellmeyer finished fourth in the boys race for Glasgow with a time of 24:11.

Jackson Strodtman won the middle school boys race with a time of 9:31 and Zachary Sayler was second with a finish of 10:04. Bronson Foster of St. Mary’s was third (11:10) and Landon Shaw led the Bulldog boys with a fourth-place finish. Caden Schlotzhauer was fifth and Lane Hackman was seventh. Danny Janssen led Higbee in seventh.

Addison Barringhaus led the middle school girls with a first-place finish of 10:39 for St. Mary’s and teammate Hannah DeMint was second with a time of 11:58. Lilly Chitwood led the New Franklin runners with a third-place finish (12:11). Stella Matyas was fourth and Reagan Derboven led Higbee with a fifth-place finish.

Full varsity results:

Boys
2. Douglass Creason N Franklin 22:04
4. Colton Sellmeyer Glasgow 24:11
7. Logan Pierce N Franklin 29:36

Girls
2. KatiJo Schaefer Glasgow 24:45
4. Mallori Burnett N Franklin 24:49
5. Hailey Derboven Higbee 26:47
6. Kylleen Gibson Higbee 26:49
8. Tehya Sellmeyer Glasgow 30:19
9. Malia Carmack Glasgow 30:56
10. Victoria Gibson Higbee 33:36
11. Emma Johnson Higbee 37:01
12. Macey Whisenand Higbee 37:03