Gateway senior David Houck finished first in a four-team Colonial Conference batch meet Tuesday at Pennypacker Park in Haddonfield and Cherry Hill.
This apears to be Houck’s first cross country race, and he won by 61 seconds. The MileSplit database shows him running track in past years but not XC, although last fall he wrote an eassy for the Gateway student web site on the challenges of cross country, so he was on the team a year ago. Just no record of him racing.
In any case, Houck, competing under the Gateway-Woodbury Co-op banner, ran 16:35 over 5,000 meters at Pennypacker and finished 1st among more than 50 runners.
Although Houck has no apparent history of racing on the trails, he did run 10:05.35 for 3,200 meters last spring and placed 4th at South Jersey Group 1 Sectionals.
Team scoring wasn’t kept, but Haddonfield runners took the next five spots and 15 of the next 17 places, with some of Haddonfield’s top runners chilling along in mid-pack.
Haddonfield, ranked No. 2 in New Jersey and No. 21 nationally, packed seniors Ryan Gibson, Michael Sinnes, Peter Simpson, Brandon Stoner and Aaron Keith 2nd through 6th all between 17:36 and 17:43, which means this was a workout more than a race for the Bulldogs.
The Haddonfield girls, ranked 9th in New Jersey, swept the top four spots and 12 of the top 14. Senior Riley Austin ran 20:12, followed by freshman Dylan Hosty [20:13], junior Molly Mills [20:14] and junior Madison Kelsey [20:16].
The West Deptford duo of senior Kayla Romanoski and junior Taylor Sierzega broke up the Haddonfield pack, taking 5th and 6th in 20:42 and 20:46.
Also in the top 10 were Haddonfield’s senior Elizabeth Pappas, junior Harper Benjamin, freshman Tatum Russo and junior Saya Sood, who all ran between 21:12 and 21:22.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 