Lions Cross Country Compete at 2025 Austin Invitational
By Coach Scott
Hippensteel
The Lockhart High School boys’ cross-country team traveled in the early morning hours of Friday, September 5, 2025, to compete at the Austin Invitational. The meet was held at Decker Lake in East Austin, with the Girls Varsity 5A and 6A Division races starting at 7:30 a.m.
The Lockhart Boys Varsity had a fantastic day, placing 5th overall out of 27 teams representing Class 5A and 6A. Lake Travis won the meet with an impressive score of just 40 points. Bowie finished second with 62 points, St. Andrews placed third with 105 points, and Austin LASA finished fourth with 128 points. Lockhart ran a strong race to secure fifth with 171 points. Other top 10 teams included Anderson in sixth with 184 points, Dripping Springs in seventh with 195, Westwood in eighth with 197, Marble Falls in ninth with 237, and Round Rock Stony Point in tenth with 289.
Junior Ethan Herrera led the way, finishing 6th overall out of 220 runners with an outstanding time of 16 minutes, 12 seconds for 5,000 meters (3.1 miles). “I am so impressed with how solid Ethan is as a runner,” the coach said. “He just makes running fast look easy. But the most impressive thing lately is his dedication to being early to practice and his relentless stretching. I’m really proud of that type of leadership, because when your best runner is doing those things, everyone else buys in.”
Freshman Rafael Urbina was Lockhart’s number two runner for the second straight week, placing 29th in 17:35. Fellow freshman Daniel Martinez was the third Lockhart finisher, running an excellent 18:01 for 39th place. “I just can’t say enough good things about two freshmen who already look like senior runners,” the coach said. “These guys are incredible. We could all see last year in junior high that they had serious talent.”
Sophomore Irving Ferretiz was the fourth man for Lockhart, finishing 46th in 18:14. “I thought Irving has looked a lot stronger the past two weeks,” the coach noted. “He’s looking good in practice again, and I think he’ll challenge Rafael and Daniel soon. That’s exactly what we want.”
The team’s fifth scorer was Jaidyn Slussler, who placed 51st in 18:27. “Jaidyn now has a year of running under his belt, and it’s starting to pay off,” said the coach. “It’s exciting to see him improve, and he now has a big role on the team as one of our top runners.”
A pair of sophomores rounded out the top seven for Lockhart. Rodrigo Barahona and Josiah Rodriguez had outstanding performances on Friday. Barahona placed 5th out of 333 runners in the Junior Varsity race with a time of 18:44, while Rodriguez placed 66th in 18:49 in his first varsity race. Both runners were only competing in their second high school races, as neither ran last year as freshmen. “We saw their talent in junior high, but they declined to run last year,” said the coach. “Now they realize how good they can be. Seeing Barahona finish 5th of 333 runners in only his second high school race was amazing.”
Other Lockhart runners who competed included Connor Zea, Eladio Figueroa Aviles, Paul Muñoz, Jonathan Davis, Alejandro Rocha, Oswaldo Sanchez Vasquez, Christian Branch, Rafael Rebollar Lopez, Ben Perales, Hayden Brast, Javier Medina, Eric Valencia Maldonado, Liam Moctezuma, Keaton Archer, James Peterson, and Koen Cox. “I am super grateful for all these guys. They did a really good job and have made our entire team much better.”
Lockhart will travel to Corpus Christi on Friday, September 12, to compete at 8:30 a.m. Saturday morning on the campus of Texas A&M–Corpus Christi at the “Islander Splash” Invitational. The team hopes to be among the top three at the District Meet on October 9 in Round Rock, before returning to Corpus Christi on Monday, October 20, for the Regional Championship on the same course. “Over the years, I’ve found that our runners can run almost a minute faster when they return to Corpus in October,” the coach said. “We are excited and fired up to run hard this Saturday.”
