Captains' Log - Riverside Showcase

The first race of the day kicked off with our Frosh group of boys from Brea Olinda High School. As the group of boys stampeded out from the starting line and onto the first turn, Drew Biegler led the team to victory and stuck on few people in front of him. Behind Drew was Owen Chau and Cameron Thuman who ran together. Our middle pack consisted of Jesus Damian, Colin Francois, and Carson Nienhouse. The most relentless group consisted of Jonathan Furumizo, Moises Salas, Andrew Viaes, Michael Galentine, and Isaiah Cardoza. By the last 800 meters of the race the team was fueled by whatever energy that they had left and the encouragement of their other team members fought through the dreadful fatigue and sped up to as many people as they could. Drew finished with a time of 12:20, Owen 13:05, Cameron 13:15, Jesus 13:47, Carson 15:12, Colin 15:43, Jonathan 17:14, Moises 17:36, Andrew Viaes 18:03, and Isaiah Cardoza 25:29. 
Despite the less than perfect racing conditions, the varsity team still managed to perform remarkably well. Shane Gaffikin nobly led the squad, sticking to the front of the race and managed to place 3rd overall with a time of 11:15. The rest of the varsity squad stuck together remarkably well, only having a gap of 21 seconds between the 2-7 runners. Scoring second, the well-marinated menace Jonathan Manara fought through sustained leg pains from earlier in the week, achieving a time of 11:45. Not far behind came the man, the myth, the MANNY Debarros with an impressive time of 11:51, beating his previous course record by over 30 seconds. Next came the deadly, dastardly, and devoted daredevil Ryan Daedler, who — detecting a doorway to the doorstep of the race — decided to deliberately drop a dozen or so dazed runners in a daring dash demonstration, decidedly deserving a distinguished time of 11:56. Literally half a second behind him came Matthew Apahidean, whose tumultuous thunder thighs topped off the team's scorers, earning a respectable time of 11:56.5. Closing off the squad finished Jordan Ostby and Jack Livingston, earning times of 12:01 and 12:07. Overall, the team placed third place, earning first place among the other division three schools. The team's performance at Riverside represents a great first step on the long road ahead to state. 
As the temperature rose, the last race of the day featured our JV squad racing some lit times. The team placed 2nd out of 13, and they were 32 seconds faster than last years team. Junior Luke Stratton finished 4th in the race at 12:16, quickly followed 23 seconds later by the long-haired-legend Andrew Velasco (with a kick that just might have broke the sound barrier). These two varsity-experienced runners mimicked the symbiotic relationship of the humble sea anemone and the valiant hermit crab. Also working together were Shane Park and Aakash Kadakia, both coming back from injuries that would disable most mortal men. Rounding out the top 5 was the silent assassin Jeremy Guerrero in his debut race on the Riverside XC course. “DJ” Dalman, Logan Rios, and Gunnar Cierly all ran significant pr’s from their previous races at the course. Senior Chris Furumizo, and Juniors Andrew Kim, Anthony Motts, and Chris Landreth also battled through the heat in order to have the best race possible. A special shoutout should be given to senior Logan Rios for being by-far the happiest runner out on the course last week. With a promising and experienced mix of juniors and seniors, and a dynamically changing rotation of our 6-10 runners...the JV team is looking primed and ready to drop bombs, and eat mom’s spaghetti.