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Cope, Goentzel medal at state cross country

Sports reporter

Marion Warrior runners Danielle Cope and Daniel Goentzel capped their high school cross country careers Saturday, with medals in the Class 3A championships in Wamego.

State competition in Classes 1, 2, 3, and 4A brought hundreds of runners and spectators to a challenging up-and-down course at the Wamego Country Club, on a day with perfect weather for racing.

The Class 3A boys championship kicked off the day, and Goentzel's time of 17:51.46 over five kilometers was good enough for 13th place.

Lane Boyer of Fredonia was the class of the field, setting a blistering pace of 16:10.74 which bested runner-up Eddie Banda of Holcomb by almost a full minute.

An hour after the start of the boys' race, Lady Warriors Cope and Camille Christensen squared off against 97 other runners in the girls' 4K event.

Cope maintained early contact with the leaders before settling into a pace that would take her to an 11th place finish in a time of 15:50.01.

In less than 10 seconds following Cope's finish, 10 runners battled neck-and-neck for the final nine medal positions.

One of those runners was Christensen, whose personal best time of 15:59.58 left her just 66 hundredths of a second shy of claiming a medal, finishing 21st.

Jylian Jaloma of Maur Hill-Mount Academy in Atchison took first with a time of 14:56.36.

Marion head coach Bethany Carlson was pleased with the way her runners performed.

"All three ran great races," she exclaimed.

Carlson made particular note of Christensen's time, which was almost a minute faster than her previous best.

"I think Camille will be very competitive next season," Carlson said. "She knows now what it takes to be a solid cross country runner, and that she has it in her."

Carlson anticipates Tacy Taylor, Louis Holt, and Ryan Jones to fill leadership voids next year created by the graduation of seniors Cope and Goentzel.

Next year's team is in a position to build on the success of this year, according to Carlson, provided runners are devoted to off-season training.

"We can be very competitive next season if we run during the summer," she said. "By running over the summer, they are adding 11 weeks of training."

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