Utah Cross Country 2013: One for the Annals

Herriman's boys, after a disappointing finish in 2012, stayed strong throughout the season to claim the 4A title and come within a whisker of a Nike Cross Nationals berth. Photo by Diana Biles.

As phenomenons go, it wasn't difficult to see this one coming. When you factor the seniors out of last spring's track and field times from the state of Utah, you still had 29 boys who ran under 4:30 for the 1600. You still had an astonishing count of 48 who ran under 10:00 for the 3200. And, for the most part, these times were recorded at altitudes of over 4000 feet.

So, it wasn't terribly surprising that Utah had an incredible year of boys cross country this fall. In fact, it may have been more surprising if the kind of season we just witnessed hadn't developed.

How big was it? Well, let's start by putting some metrics on it.

American Fork and Davis easily claimed the top two positions at Nike Cross Regionals. 4A Herriman came within a whisker of claiming the #3 position and also within a whisker of claiming an at-large berth to Nike Cross Nationals. Sending three teams to Nike Cross Nationals would be unprecedented for a state the size of Utah. That kind of honor has heretofore gone to state with monster populations--states like New York, Texas, and California. 

Utah logged six of the top ten team places at NXR-SW, with American Fork, Davis, Herriman, Mountain View, Bonneville, and Ogden each claiming places in the top 10. 

All of this took place a full month after the state-sanctioned season had taken its curtain call. But training through the year has become the norm in Utah; it is no longer the exception propagated by an elite few.

Four of the top eight and six of the top 13 all-time top team times on the state course were recorded at this year's meet. Those marks were recorded across three classifications--3A, 4A, and 5A. 

Herriman and Bonneville battled to one of the best team contests ever staged on the Sugarhouse Park course in 4A, with Herriman edging Bonneville for the team title on a tie-breaker.

At the end of the season, four guys (Ben Saarel, Jordan Cross, Jerrell Mock, and Jake Heslington) had posted 3-mile teams on the south side of 15:00. All but Mock went sub-15 on the 5K course at Nike Cross Regionals. 

It wasn't much more difficult to see the season that the girls had coming. After a somewhat disappointing finish for the Utah schools at NXR-SW in 2011, everything seemed to build from that point forward. 

We saw hints of Ogden's determination early and often during the indoor track season. Those hints continued to be dropped throughout the outdoor season. At the 5A level, Davis simply destroyed everyone in sight in the outdoor track season. Park City, though running behind Ogden at the outdoor state meet, was already nipping at the heels of the Tigers by the end of track season. What we didn't see clearly before the end of track season was any indication of how strong of a cross country team either American Fork or Mountain Crest were to become. I can only infer those swords were forged and polished over the summer.

Davis went all the way through the state meet essentially unchallenged in the 5A ranks. By the end of the season, however, American Fork had clearly emerged as the top contender. A late-season charge by Mountain Crest stunned pretty much everyone, as the Mustangs rolled through their regional meet and through state with scarcely a whimper of resistance, blowing out Orem and Skyline in the process. 3A came down to a battle to the end, with Park City enjoying the final hurrah over Ogden.

Individually, the ranks were thinner at the top among the girls than among the boys, but it was still a remarkable season. Summer Harper started the season at the top, but Herriman's Lucy Biles kept pressing the issue until she more or less claimed the top position among the state's female cross country runners. Seven Utah runners finished sub-18:00 at Nike Cross Regionals. At the state's more usual distance of three miles, five girls logged times below 18:00--Biles, Harper, Aimee Bryson, Ellie Child, and Shea Martinez.

The Utah girls teams were very much present at the top of the leaderboard at NXR-SW as well. After Davis in first came Park City and Ogden in fifth and sixth, then American Fork and Mountain Crest in ninth and 10th. That ranks as Utah's strongest showing ever at the regional event.

Next year will surely bring much of the same excitement, but take a moment or two as the season winds down to appreciate all the excellence served up on a silver platter from this fall's season. As much as it's starting to seem this year, this really doesn't happen every year.