Both girls and boys cross country excelled in their recent Tiger Inivitational meet. Photo courtesy of Robert Miranda.

By Silas Stewart

In the non-league Tiger Invitational, senior Robert Miranda and the Menlo Cross Country team’s times were quite good, as both the girls and boys teams displayed prowess on the course.

Although the boys team as a whole placed 20th, Miranda finished first and set a course record of 15 minutes and one second in the process. The girls squad placed 5th, an astonishingly high finish.

The boys Menlo cross country team has a myriad of runners of all ages who are contributing to the team, demonstrating how strong Menlo’s team will be for the next several year. Six of the eight runners finished under 20 minutes on the 3.1-mile course. Although he was far out in front, Miranda had a good team running behind him, including Josh Eichbaum, who posted a time of 17:25, Brandon April, who timed at 18:34, and Max Dostart-Meers, who finished at 19:13. All of those runners finished in the top 200.

The Menlo girls cross country team also finished extremely well, finishing near the top of the 32 teams at the meet. Every runner placed in the top 200, and the top finishers were all underclassmen. Like the boys team, Menlo will continue to be a cross country powerhouse for the next several years. Sophomores Kyra Pretre and Charlotte Tomkinson paved the way for the Knights. Pretre finished 11th with a time of 19:12 and Tomkinson placed 23rd with a time of 19:58. Maddie Sanders and Marisa Castagna placed 60th and 72nd respectively, with times of 21:03 and 21:19.

Both teams will soon move into WBAL meets, and will look to their younger runners to step up big time.