Woodland girls 4th, boys 12th at Blastow Early Bird XC meet

The Woodland High School girls placed fourth and the boys were 12th of 16 schools at the Bob Blastow Early Bird Cross Country Meet Saturday at the McIntosh Nature Preserve in Douglas County.

The defending Class 5A state champion Lady Cats, finished behind classification rival McIntosh, Milton and Harrison.

Nicole Pachuta of Oconee County was the girls’ individual race winner in 18:18.83. There were 113 runners girls’ runners.

Individual finishes for the Woodland girls team:

5th - Carli Clymer 19:13.63

8th - Angela Cochran 19:18.98

19th - Baylee Evans 19:46.00

28th - McKenna Trapheagen 19:59.74

29th - Cheyenne Spinks 20:00.44

35th - Lindsay Scifers 20:19.84

71st - Mackenzie Stephenson 22:33.33

85th - Piercy Gierlak 23:36.64

“This meet was an important reminder for our girls that this is a new season and we have lots of work to do if we hope to repeat as state champions,” said Woodland head coach Matthew Landolt.

Milton won the boys’ race that included 119 runners and sixteen teams. Pope was second followed by Cambridge, Starrs Mill, and McIntosh.

Sam Bowers (15:00.78) and Nicholas Yanek (15:01.97) of Milton finished first and second in the individual boys' race.

Individual finishes for the Woodland boys team:

70th - Reece Mitchell 18:17.99

77th - Dylan Stermer 18:37.31

88th - Kobe Cochran 18:57.32

94th - Noah Warren 19:09.15

98th - Tracy Grimes 19:23.22

109th - Stanton Bedwell 20:43.22

113th - Levi Brandenburg 21:32.92

“The boys actually finished a little better than we expected. We had multiple athletes missing due to SATs today,” added Landolt.

Next up for the Woodland teams is the Coach Benson Double Dip Invitational Saturday, September 9 at Marist School in Atlanta.