This past Saturday, November 2, the McIntosh cross country teams dominated the Region 4 AAAAA championship at the Heritage Christian Church course. The teams won all 4 races: varsity girls, varsity boys, junior varsity girls and junior varsity boys. Official results can be found at ga.milesplit.com.

The varsity girls ran first at 8:30 a.m. Junior Taylor Snell led the Lady Chiefs in a season best time of 19:53 for the 5K, finishing in fourth. She was followed by sophomore Alyssa LeClaire (20:05-sixth), freshman Rachel Ward (20:06-seventh), freshman Caitlin Umila (20:25-tenth) and junior Tarna Zander-Velloso (20:41-fourteenth). Sophomore Nicole Zaubi finished seventeenth in 21:26, and junior Camille Norman finished right after in 21:29. Summing up the competitive race, senior runner Kate Reissing said, “It was the most exciting race I have seen this year.”

The varsity boys ran at 9:00 a.m. Seniors Joshua Mattingly and Taylor Huntley placed first and second, respectively, with National Elite times of 16:08 and 16:15 for the 5K. Senior Andrew Jaeger finished eighth in 16:40, followed by senior Josh Reynolds (17:21-sixteenth) and sophomore Alex Wilson (17:29-twentieth). Seniors Johnathan Hall and Tommy O’Brien finished 27th  (17:47) and 36th (18:13) respectively.

The junior varsity girls won with an impressive 16 points; six MHS girls placed in the top seven finishers. Sophomore Maddie Smith won in 22:06, freshman Hannah Wilde placed second in 22:10, senior Kate Reissing placed third in 22:22, senior Jennifer McIntyre placed fourth in 22:23, freshman Clara Comiskey placed sixth in 22:33 and senior Monica Jamison placed seventh in 22:42. Placing in the top 20 finishers, sophomore Marina Haldopolous placed thirteenth in 23:45, and junior Alexa Bilskey placed seventeenth in 23:57.

The junior varsity boys rounded up the successful meet with another MHS win. Sophomore Tyler Nigro won the race in 17:23. Sophomore Brian Doyle placed fourth in 18:01, followed by sophomore Alan Bowers in fifth (18:02), sophomore Connor Reynolds in sixth (18:08) and junior Johnny Vargas in tenth (18:21). Also placing in the top 20 were senior Joey Buehler in seventeenth (18:39) and freshman Jackson Routon in nineteenth (18:46). Two more runners earned varsity letter times of sub-19 minutes for the 5K: sophomores Jacob Rideout (18:54-24th) and Owen Miller (18:55-25th).

The meet was a team success accomplished by numerous individual successes. In all, 35 runners ran personal records or season best times, and 29 runners ran varsity letter times of sub-19 minutes for boys and sub-23 minutes for girls.