Green Hill Park will be the site of the annual Knights Crossing cross country extravaganza this Saturday. The Lord Botetourt and James River teams will both be competing in the big event, which draws teams from all over the East coast and takes up most of the day at the west Roanoke County park.
The cross country season began for most area teams with the “Bengal Clash” at the Smith River Sports Complex in Axton last Thursday, hosted by Bassett High School. The Abingdon boys and Christiansburg girls came out on top in the varsity team meets and LB and River both competed as well.
“With such a long season, we primarily run the first meet as a workout,” said first year LB coach Noel Preece. “On the women’s side, freshman Jules Banka ran negative splits to run 24:57, placing 41st out of over 140 athletes. On the men’s side, seniors Eric Duncan and Ethan Thorne ran a successful interval workout, crossing the line together with a time of 16:12 to place first and second.”
In the men’s race the Cavaliers finished fifth as a team and James River was 16th among 23 teams. River’s best time was a 30th place finish by Braden Jones.
In the women’s race James River was 11th among 19 teams, paced by Maddie Davidson in 21st.
