US Junior Team Races Saturday

      Saturday the Great Edinburgh Challenge will be held in Scotland.  A team of junior men as well as junior women (under twenty years of age) will represent the United States and face teams from the Great Britain, Northern Ireland and Europe.   The team members are already in Scotland and will race at 5 AM Eastern Standard time.    Here is a brief look at the full compliment of junior runners.  There will be only two prep runners and both competed in the recent Foot Locker national championship.  Sophie Chase is the Virginia State champion and was the winner of the South Regional for Foot Locker.   Sophie placed sixth in San Diego with a time of 17:42.   The Maymont Invitational winner finished a second ahead of Anna Holdiman, who was the Iowa 3A champion.   The other runners are all collegians but Molly Seidel, who runs for Notre Dame, was the 2011 Foot Locker champion and also represented America in this race last year taking third overall.  Caroline Kellner is a freshman at Cornell University but was a 2011 Foot locker national finalist, as was Taylor Manett who now runs for the University of Michigan.   The final female representative is Emily Stites, who runs for William & Mary.

     There are only three male runners on the male side, who are preps but two ran at Foot Locker in December.   Jacob Leingang is the North Dakota champion and he placed third at Foot Locker in 15:07. Jake also claimed forth at Foot Locker in 2011.  The Kentucky champion Jacob Thomson finished fifth at Foot Locker with 15:14.   Estevan De La Rosa garnered second in the California D1 championship last fall, which earned him an invitation to the Portland Mud Bowl, where he secured second.   Tony Smoragiewicz is a freshman at the University of Michigan after placing seventh in Foot Locker in 2011, while Craig Novak, a freshman at Oklahoma State, came in 14th at Foot Locker in 2011.  Ryan Roush is a freshman at Malone College in Canton, Ohio.   Malone incidentally has long held the major meet for high school (also collegiate) runners in Ohio and offers a wonderful cross country course.