LHS Boys Cross County travel to Texas A&M Corpus Christi Invitationals

By Coach Scott 

Hippensteel                           

     Saturday September 13th, the Lockhart Varsity Boys Cross Country team traveled to Corpus Christi this past weekend.  The “Islander Splash” Invitational is held on the campus of Texas A&M Corpus Christi. The purpose of the meet is so that athletes who are in Region IV can preview the course before they run on it at the Regional Meet.  

     The final meet results showed Lockhart Lions finished fourth of 36 teams running in the “Large School” division.  “I was really proud of the effort, we are improving each and every week, and you can see how all the hard work is paying off.”

     In the team standings there were 36 high schools competing.   Harlingen South won the team title with 70 points, Brownsville Donna was second with 106 points, Laredo Martin finished third with 142 points, Lockhart grabbed fourth place with 169 points, and Eagle Pass scored 213 points.   

    “Even though we didn’t win today, I firmly believe this team is capable of winning meets like this one in the very near future.”  “I think one year from now we will have a very good shot of winning this meet,” “We are very young, but tremendously talented, and hard-working.”

     For the 5th year in a row Lockhart had the winning individual runner in the race.  Anthony Parra won in 2021, Zeke Sanchez won in both 2022, and 2023, and last year as a sophomore Ethan Herrera won the title.  “I was very pleased with the way Ethan ran the race and ended up as the individual title.” “Ethan was very smart as he didn’t go out too fast and saved his best running for the last two miles of the race.”  “He was about 10th of 301 runners at the mile mark but slowly ran everyone down.”  

     Freshman Rafael Urbina continues to impress as placed 15th in 18:14. Sophomore Irving Ferretiz was the third Lockhart finisher in 46th place, Junior Ivan Gonzales was the fourth man in 51st place.  Completing the top five and the scoring was Eladio Figueroa Aviles placed 70th.  

     Other Lockhart runners competing included Jaidyn Slussler 82nd, Josiah Rodriguez 90th, Alejandro Rocha 139th, Paul Munoz 142nd, Rodrigo Barahona 146th, Oswaldo Vasquez Sanchez 150th, Connor Zea 174th, Daniel Martinez 191st, Hayden Brast 250th, and Keaton Archer 258th.  

     Lockhart will next run at the Luling Invitational on Saturday September 27th, and then will have 12 days to get ready for the district 25AAAAA Championships on Thursday October 9th at Old Settler’s Park in Round Rock.