Custer girls are conference champs

By: 
Ron Burtz

The Custer varsity girls cross county runners are setting their sights on the Region 5A title this week after being crowned Black Hills Conference champions at the conference meet at Deadwood last Thursday.
The girls took first place in a field of 10 teams with a team score of 28. Hill City was second with 52 points. Meanwhile the varsity boys placed second behind Sturgis with a team score of 36 compared with 29 for the Scoopers.
Senior Kadense Dooley finished a mere eight seconds behind conference individual champ Peyton VanDeest of Spearfish. Dooley completed the race in 19:43.11 for her second place finish. Teammate Ramsey Karim was third in a time of 19:55.66.
“I worried about them,” said coach Karen Karim of her girls, “but they looked strong. They looked good.”
Senior Eva Studt, who has been consistently improving her times throughout the season, finished sixth in 20:29.64.
“Eva was kind of in no-man’s land,” remarked Karim, “having to run by herself for a good chunk of it and ran a pretty fast time.”
Karim said it has helped Studt to have training partners who are a little bit faster to push her to press harder.
The next runner to cross the line for Custer was sophomore Brit Wheeler, who finished 17th in a time of 22:01.16.
Concerned that in a big race the fairly new varsity runner might not know how to set her pace and where to be, Karim said she gave Wheeler a strategy for the race.
“I had kind of picked out a couple of girls from Sturgis for her to stay with and run with and she beat the girl I told her to beat,” Karim said.  
The fifth and sixth runners for the Wildcats were Mattea Marshall, 32nd (23:41.21) and Sierra Swanson, 45th (25:44.65).
In the boys race it was again senior Miles Ellman in the lead for Custer. Ellman finished third behind Belle Fourche’s Sawyer Clarkson and a runner from Spearfish with a time of 17:27.84.
“Miles had a very good race,” noted Karim. “These last few weeks he’s been racing much better, staying within himself early on and then finishing much stronger than earlier in the season where he was getting out after it, which was nice, but he wasn’t able to hang on.”
Karim said she hopes the senior keeps improving and that he will be one of the top runners at the state meet.
Coming back strong from recent illness, Gage Grohs finished sixth in 17:58.67.
“He’s finally had a week or so of solid training without being sick or hurt and so he’s coming on stronger,”  Karim said.
Preston Drew came in 12th in a time of 18:25.93 followed by Drew Lehman in 15th place in 18:37.38.
“As a senior Preston’s had a very solid season,” said Karim. “He was a little disappointed with his race because he said he didn’t feel great but he was still faster than he ran at that course last year.”
Karim said she believes the runner could be a contender for medals at the state meet if he keeps pushing.
Regarding Lehman, Karim said, “Drew is starting to learn what he’s capable of and gain a little bit more confidence in his racing.”
Custer’s fifth runner was Sterling Sword who finished in 32nd place in 20:31.41.
The last runner to cross the finish line for the Wildcats was Alex Van Horn who placed 36th in a time of 20:45.66. However, in the 5K JV race, Landon Woodward beat Van Horn’s time by 10 seconds so he will be the sixth runner this week for the region meet.
With Custer now hosting the Region 5A meet this week and with bad weather moving in, Karim admitted, “I’m kind of walking on eggshells to make sure we get through the next two weeks.”
Worried about weather and sickness, Karim said she’s focused on keeping her runners healthy “so they can do their job and get themselves to the state meet.”
The region meet is set for Thursday at Rocky Knolls Golf Course. The varsity races are set to begin at noon and the top three teams as well as the top 20 places will advance to the state finals in Sioux Falls near the end of the month.  
 

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