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Red Raider cross country finishes 10th at Liberty Bell Meet

In what will undoubtedly be their most challenging competition of the season, the Sidney High varsity cross country teams produced another strong run at the Liberty Bell Invitational Friday afternoon in Littleton, Colo.

The boys placed 10th out of 23 teams in Division 3A with a score of 242. The girls also came in 10th among the 23 teams in the same division, putting up a score of 273.

With their solid performance on Friday, both the Sidney boys' and girls' teams are currently ranked No. 2 statewide in class C.

Head coach Tony Neels was impressed with his runners' efforts.

"Overall, I was very pleased," Neels said. "The course, as usual, was extremely fast and every one of our runners posted a season-best time. With 23 teams competing, I was happy to have a Top 10 finish for both the boys and the girls considering the degree of competition we faced."

Senior Jachob Wiedeburg led the Sidney boys' team with a 5K time of 16:56 – a reduction of 37 seconds from his time at the Gering meet – and a 28th-place finish out of 317 runners. 

Senior Hayden Lienemann followed, placing 35th in 17:04. The team's third senior, Brody McKnight, finished 46th in 17:32. Sophomore Ryan Aurich came in 66th overall  at 18:08, while fellow sophomore Logan Uhlir placed 70th, eight seconds behind Aurich.

The two juniors – Jacob Schaub and Brenner Keane – finished 74th and 93rd, respectively. Schaub came in at 18:17, while Keane finished in 18:36.

In the girls' race, junior Erin Lindeman led the Sidney pack with a time of 21:06, which placed her 46th out of 145 runners. Junior Presley Allen's finish in 21:13 was good for 48th place. Freshman Chantal Riggs, racing for the first time on varsity this year, finished third for the Red Raiders– 54th overall in 21:18.

Junior Abby Heller registered a time of 21:25 for 56th place, freshman Charlie Brockhaus came in 69th with a 21:46, senior Maddie Stafford placed 71st overall with a 21:48 and junior Mia Hernandez rounded out the girls' squad with a 22:12, placing her 82nd overall.

The top four girls' runners finished within 19 seconds of each other. Neels says that's a testament to the excellent depth on the team.

"We have so much depth on the girls' team that it's difficult to predict who will be our top runners on any given day," Neels said. "That is a great problem to have and the girls will have to continue to work hard if they want a varsity spot at the end of the season."

The varsity teams will compete in their third meet of the season on Friday afternoon in McCook. The girls will kick things off at 2 p.m. CST and the boys will begin a half hour later.

 

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