The DeForest High School girls' and boys' cross country teams faced their stiffest competition of the season to date last Saturday at the 71st Annual Midwest Invite in Janesville.
Some of the top teams in Wisconsin turned out for the event. There were 31 teams in the boys' field, and 28 on the girls' side.
The Lady Norskies more than held their own at the event as they finished in 12th place with a final score of 335.
"We had a very good day, and we finished higher than I expected we would which was nice. We were not at 100 percent. We have had problems keeping everybody healthy, so it was nice to do this well," said DHS girls' coach Chris Smith.
Lake Park (IL) claimed the team title with and impressive final tally of 70, while rounding out the Top 5 was Waukesha Catholic Memorial (112), Janesville Craig (115), Hartland Arrowhead (158) and Madison West (202).
Meanwhile, the Norski boys finished in 17th place after totaling 534 team points.
"Basically it is almost like a State Meet. I thought our guys performed well. They all ran season bests. The course lent itself to being very fast," said boys' coach Joe Parker.
Neenah edged out Madison La Follette 84-92 to claim the boys' title, while closing out the Top 5 was Janesville Craig (142), Hartland Arrowhead (144) and Lake Park (183).
Leading the way for the Lady Norskies on Saturday was Anna Howery, who came finished the race in 16 minutes, 9 seconds. Her time earned her 48th place overall.
"For the first time she ran hard enough early to find her limit, and we need to do that for the rest of the year. She is such a strong second-half runner, and she found out about how fast she can go early," Smith said about Howery.
DeForest also got a big boost from Sarah Hoekstra, who finished in 56th place after clocking in at 16:19.
"I thought out of everybody Hoekstra had just an unbelievable day. She hasn't run a race like that. For whatever the reason everything clicked. She improved my almost a minute," said Smith.
DeForest's Taylor Legried worked her way around the course in 16:36 to take 72nd place, while teammate Katie Williams (16:44) was not far behind in 77th place.
Larissa Schlitz (16:50) closed out the scoring for DHS after placing 82nd.
Lizzy Owen (118th, 17:23) and Rachel Campbell (135th, 17:50) also ran for the Lady Norskies but they did not factor into the team score.
The DeForest boys squad did not have a runner finish in the Top 5, but Kyle Eisler was close.
Eisler turned in a time of 17:23 to take 55th place.
"Kyle continues to add aggressiveness to his intelligent racing, and I still don't think he has seen the best his body can do. He still has a little fine tuning to do before he runs his best race," said Parker about Eisler.
Josh Knuteson was the second DHS runner to cross the finish-line, and he did so in 17:37 to take 72nd place.
"Josh had a great last quarter mile. He is a middle-distance guy in track, so he can kick with anybody. He has to keep working on the middle miles," Parker said about Knuteson.
Adam Woods (18:18) helped the Norskies out by placing 109th, while teammate Tyler Grinstead (18:36) was 128th.
Casey Paplow ran the race in 19:24 to close out the scoring for DHS with a 170th-place finish.
Justin Hageman (189th, 19:59) raced for DeForest, but his finish did not count toward the team total.
Both Norski squads will travel to Tomah on Tuesday for a 5 p.m. meet.
