Freshman is fifth

CELINA, Ohio — Lydia Keihn made her way toward the front at the 1-mile mark.

Only Woodlan’s Abbey Gentz, Celina’s Kaylee Dameron and Kenton’s Kierra Krohmer were ahead of her.

As Gentz continued to pull away throughout the rest of the race, a twinge in Keihn’s calf prevented her from keeping up.

Keihn, a Jay County High School freshman, finished fifth in the first run of her career as the Patriot girls cross country team had three end in the top 15 Saturday during the Division 1/2 race in the Celina Rotary Invitational at Wright State University Lake Campus.

“I don’t think she would say she ran her best race,” said JCHS coach Paul Hyatt, whose girls squad was fourth out of eight teams. “She said she kind of had some cramping up in her calf toward the finish so she wasn’t able to kick it very big.

“She would say she didn’t run it the way she wanted to. (For) her first high school invite, I’m very, very proud of her.”

Celina won with 61 points, while St. Marys Memorial (74) and Kenton (76) were second and third, respectively. Jay County totaled 83.

In the Division 3 girls’ race, Fort Recovery scored 144 for sixth out of nine teams. Fort Loramie won the team championship with 29 points.

The Patriot boys scored 176 points for eighth. Bellmont had four of the top five spots to win with 18 points.

Fort Recovery’s boys, led by Drew Muhlenkamp’s eighth-place finish, was seventh out of 10 teams. South Adams won with 54 points.

Keihn, who was the Allen County Athletic Conference champion as an eighth grader at East Jay, moved ahead of Krohmer during the second mile, but then her calf ailment started to kick in. Kromher jumped in front of Keihn — so too did Celina’s Joscelyn Dameron — and Keihn crossed the finish line in 21 minutes, 9.27 seconds.

“She works hard and she really, really wants to … I think her big goal is to run in college someday,” Hyatt said. “I hope to help her foster that and I think we’re well on our way with all of that.

“Slightly over 21 minutes and fifth-place finish, I think she’ll be able to beat that by the end of the season without a doubt.”

Gentz won in 19:28.68.

Jay County sophomore Raven Weaver ended in 21:58.72, making a late push to pass Memorial’s Ellen Schloemer and Celina’s Zoey Aukerman to cross the finish line in eighth place. Sophia Fugiett (22:16.58) was 12th, Lindy Wood (23:32.29) finished 21st and Lita Chowning (26:07.64) placed 39th.

“Couldn’t be happier with the way it went,” Hyatt said. “Wish that we could get things figured out as far as getting that total down. They did what they needed to do. They employed good strategy.

“A lot of them ran really strong in spite of a lot of things they had not going for them today.”

Freshman Thomas LeMaster was the top JCHS boy as he was 29th in 19:53.94. Aaron Funkhouser (20:00.7) finished 34th, Mitchell Winner (20:35.99) took 44th, Isaac Kunkler (20:58.44) finished 49th and Griffin Lennartz (21:02.95) was 51st.

In addition to Muhlenkamp’s time of 18:26.85, Fort Recovery senior Jared Timmerman placed 32nd in 20:19.6. Connor Gower finished 38th in 20:50.56, John Knapke ended 48th in 21:22.97 and Ethan Evers had a time of 22:17.35 for 66th.

Fort Recovery’s girls were led by Hannah Metzger and Alyssa Heinrichs, who were back-to-back in 26th and 27th, respectively. Metzger had a time of 23:03.39, while Heinrichs ended in 23:05.75. Megan Diller (23:21.65) and Alexis Wendel (23:29.44) were 34th and 35th, respectively, and Sarah Siefring finished 38th in 23:37.96.