Northern Burlington’s Liliah Gordon and Ocean City recorded impressive victories in the Varsity C race Saturday morning at the 47th annual Shore Coaches Invitational at Holmdel County Park.
Gordon ran 18:20 and won by 120 meters over Ocean City senior Maeve Smith, who ran 18:46 and led the Red Raiders to a 47-65 team victory over Middletown South.
Ocean City first.
The Raider’s first four girls – Smith, senior Chloe Care, sophomore Carly Godfrey and freshman Riley Tolson – all finished in the top seven, all under 20 minutes on the challenging Holmdel course.
Care was 4th in 19:25, Godfrey 5th in 19:39 and Tolson 19:48 in her first try at the historic Holmdel 5,000-meter layout.
They were backed up by 5th runner junior Gabrielle Henry, 34th in 21:44, and sophomore Peighton Clemens, 36th in 21:52.
Ocean City – ranked 4th in New Jersey – averaged 19:52 for its top five, 8th-fastest ever by a South Jersey school at Holmdel, fastest in school history by far for Ocean City and also fastest any South Jersey school has ever averaged at Shore Coaches. The previous best was Haddonfield’s 20:08 in the D race in 2021.
Ocean City’s previous best team average at Holmdel was 20:14.16 at the 2012 state Group 3 meet with Mary Kate Brelsford, Devin Grisbaum, Bridget Flynn, Erin Myers and Brenna Clark.
This is Ocean City’s 4th Shore Coaches team title. The Red Raiders also won Group B in 1993 and 1994 and Group C in 2022.
As for Gordon, this is her 3rd Shore Coaches victory. She won Group B as a freshman and Group C last year.
She joins 4-time winner and future Olympian Erin Donohue of Haddonfield, 1st in Group E in 1997, F in 1998 and E again in 1999 in 2000 as well as Kingsway’s Lori Townsend – who won Group B each year from 1988 through 1990 – and Kingsway’s Chelsea Ley – who won Group B each year from 2007 through 2009 – as 3rd three-time Shore Coaches winner from South Jersey.
Gordon is 9th-fastest at Holmdel from South Jersey with her 18:14 when she won last year’s state Group 3 title.
Also finishing in the top 20 in Group C was Delsea senior Juliana Sieminski, 14th in 20:31.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 