Oskaloosa and Eddyville-Blakesburg Open Cross Country Season
The "Highway 63 Showdown" opener between Oskaloosa and Eddyville-Blakesburg ended with the Osky Boys taking home the traveling trophy for this year.
Oskaloosa, Iowa – The Oskaloosa cross country team opened it’s season with a dual meet against Eddyville-Blakesburg hosted at Edmundson Park in Oskaloosa. The “Highway 63 Showdown” will be an annual event to open the season. Temperatures for the meet were in the 90s with high humidity. In the 2011 edition of this meet, Oskaloosa was the victor winning the boys race by a score of 22 – 33. The Oskaloosa team also won the girls race as Eddyville-Blakesburg did not have enough girls run to complete a team score. Brooke Van Houweling won the girls race on a time of 18:44 on a hot, muggy afternoon, leading Oskaloosa to a sweep of the top 5 spots. Brooke ran a very controlled race and easily outdistanced the other runners. She was followed by Kelsey Roquet, Paige Walter, Lesley Roquet and Gabi Boxler. I thought the girls ran very well given the weather conditions. this is a challenging course and the weather conditions made it even tougher. I was very happy with all of my girls. It is a good meet to give us a chance to see where we are at and what we need to work on to get better. It was almost a survival race. I learned alot about the girls and what kind of shape we are in. I think they will develop into a very fine team by the end of the year.
Skylar DeJong won the boys race running a time of 19:17 to easily outdistance the pack. Spencer DeJong was 2nd. with Jared Boggess (5th), Gerrit VanMaanen(6th) and Logan Ashman (8th). rounding out the top 5 Indian boys. We have a very young team with 8 freshman in our 12 runners. The are a talented group, but need to learn to run the longer distance and therefore, I was pretty happy with the performances they turned in tonight. Skylar ran a very solid race and Spencer did well for his first cross country race as well. We have a lot of things we need to work on, but I think this group is a hard working bunch that will improve over the course of the season. We’re nowhere near where we need to be. It was a good start of the kids and we have several who ran their first cross country races.
Girls 4K Race School Time
1 Brooke VanHouweling Oskaloosa 18:44.0
2 Kelsey Roquet Oskaloosa 20:13.0
3 Paige Walter Oskaloosa 20:36.0
4 Lesley Roquet Oskaloosa 20:49.0
5 Gabi Boxler Oskaloosa 21:00.0
6 Emily Flaig Eddyville-Blakesburg 21:07.0
7 Riley Berg Oskaloosa 21:46.0
8 Natalie Whitis Oskaloosa 23:36.0
9 Amanda Stefanik Oskaloosa 23:51.0
10 Meghan Toubekis Oskaloosa 24:31.0
11 Alina Nettesheim Oskaloosa 24:33.0
12 Angela Hyland Oskaloosa 24:39.0
13 Lauren Gorski Oskaloosa 26:11.0
14 Kayley Keller Oskaloosa 26:23.0
15 Kenzie Gunter Oskaloosa 27:34.0
Team Scores
Oskaloosa 15
Eddyville-Blakesburg no team score
Boys 5K Race School Time
1 Skylar DeJong Oskaloosa 19:17.0
2 Spencer DeJong Oskaloosa 20:41.0
3 Christopher Welch Eddyville-Blakesburg 21:24.0
4 Steven Donahue Eddyville-Blakesburg 21:33.0
5 Jared Boggess Oskaloosa 22:01.0
6 Gerritt VanMaanen Oskaloosa 22:44.0
7 Jack Hastings Eddyville-Blakesburg 23:25.0
8 Logan Ashman Oskaloosa 23:49.0
9 Jackson Voyles Eddyville-Blakesburg 24:15.0
10 Hunter Wilz Eddyville-Blakesburg 24:16.0
11 Kamron VanHulzen Oskaloosa 24:20.0
12 Alex Hyland Oskaloosa 24:28.0
13 Jared Buckallew Oskaloosa 24:40.0
14 Gabe DeWitt Eddyville-Blakesburg 24:50.0
15 Logan Gross Oskaloosa 25:10.0
16 Brad Roe Eddyville-Blakesburg 25:12.0
17 Riley Calhoun Eddyville-Blakesburg 28:04.0
18 Bradley VerSteegh Eddyville-Blakesburg 28:43.0
19 Greg Comstock Oskaloosa 29:29.0
20 Scott Couch Eddyville-Blakesburg 29:47.0
21 Cole Oscarson Oskaloosa 31:04.0
22 Adam Genskow Oskaloosa 31:39.0
23 Austin Roe Eddyville-Blakesburg 36:05.0
24 Nathanial Bay Eddyville-Blakesburg 40:11.0
25 Dylan Ulin Eddyville-Blakesburg 41:53.0
Team Scores
Oskaloosa 22
Eddyville-Blakesburg 33
