At only the second meet of her season, Danielle Friend of Ephrata is already breaking records.
“I’m happy. It helped to go faster,” she says after running the 2.35 mile course in 14:48, shattering the old course record. Ellensburg is her favorite course, so setting a course record was a special treat. She likes to run relaxed and focus on her breathing while racing. When asked about her special preparations outside of practice, she told me “I don’t drink pop at all through cross country season, and I try to limit the candy and sugar.”
Kevin Aubol , of Ellensburg, doesn’t look like your typical runner. He’s tall and has long, blonde hair. His hair doesn’t distract him in the race, “I think about pace, pushing the second mile, not slowing down and tactics, mostly.” In preparing for the Ellensburg Invite, hydration was key. “For this meet, I began preparing yesterday, besides practice,” he tells me, after missing the course record by one second, running a 12:03 and coming in far ahead of the second place runner, Jose Marcial of Kiona-Benton. Kevin doesn’t eat a special meal the night before a meet, but he does do lots of base running, intervals and strength training in the weeks preceding a meet. He says his dream course would be similar to the Ellensburg course, “I like a mix of trails, like the ones here, with more hills, but the ground would be bark. Definitely not gravel or grass.”
Jose Marcial, a senior at Kiona-Benton, is in many ways the opposite of Kevin Aubol. He’s not tall, and has short, brown hair. “It feels good to be a top athlete,” he says. Unlike the other runners I talked to, he does have several “rituals” he does before a meet. “I eat a lot of Cliff Bars and drink a lot of Gatorade, sometimes some Mexican food, and the night before, I eat a lot of spaghetti and pizza like everyone else,” he tells me, wearing his two lucky jerseys and the same outfit he wears at every race, for good luck. If he could, Jose says he would buy all Adidas shoes, but he usually just wears whatever is comfortable. When asked for his best advice for runners, he said, “If it feels good, run fast. If it feels bad, run faster.”
Results:
Varsity Boys- Ellensburg (49), West Valley-Yakima (89), Sunnyside (97), East Valley-Yakima (126), Ephrata (146), Wapato (199), Cashmere (200), Royal (216), Goldendale (224), Cle Elum/Roslyn (226), Grandview (257), Mariner (302), Othello (337), Riverside Christian (340).
Varsity Girls: Ephrata (56), West Valley-Yakima (61), Ellensburg (66), Wapato (96), East Valley-Yakima (127), Riverside Christian (150), Cashmere (157), Royal (179).
Teams participating (non-scoring/no place): Yakima Nation Tribal, Granger, Kiona-Benton, Wahluke, Warden, Prosser, Sunnyside.