Another big race on tap for Pony harriers

Last weekend, the Havre High cross country teams tested their strengths at the prestigious Mountain West Classic. And this Friday, they will challenge themselves again against some of the best runners Class A and Class AA has to offer.

Six days after running in Missoula, the Blue Ponies will run in Great Falls at the Eagle Falls Golf Course. The meet will give both Havre teams a chance to see how they stack up against the rest of Class A, while at the same time, serving as a preview for the state meet, which will be run at Eagle Falls next month. Friday’s meet will get underway at 3 p.m.

“The kids are definitely excited,” HHS head coach Josh Holt said. “We will get a chance to run at the same course where state is held. State has always been in Helena or Missoula, so it will be in Great Falls this year and that will be fantastic. We will also get a chance to run against a lot of our other Class A competition.”

Last week, neither the boys or girls teams notched high finishes at the Mountain West Classic, but with the high-level of competition that they were facing, it’s nothing to be ashamed of and the truth is, Holt came away impressed with his team.

“I think that we showed a lot of improvement,” Holt said. “It was hard to judge if we really had better times than we did last year because they changed the course. So that made it different. And the course was really tight at times so it was hard to pass. So some of our kids just kind of settled in where they were and probably didn’t run quite as good a time as they could have.”

The Havre girls will be led into Great Falls by senior Rachel David, who was the only Pony runner, boy or girl, to crack the Top-100 at the Mountain West. She will look to put together another impressive outing to pace the HHS girls, and she will be joined by teammates Rainey Stoner, Hannah Lunak, Amelia Miller, Marca Herron, Nicole Parsons and Meggie Zook.

On the boys side of things, a couple of freshman are opening eyes as both Lane Paulson and Jakob Keller ran well a week ago. They are part of a nucleus that also features the Pony boys’ top runner Austin Jones, who has been the top finisher for the HHS boys in each meet this season.

“I think both of my freshmen have done really well,” Holt said. “Our whole team as a whole is doing well, we just need to keep improving and keep working to get our times down.”

Joining Jones, Paulson and Keller in Great Falls for the varsity squad will be Brock Ross, Cameron Knapton, Bobby O’Leary and Barrett Kilgore. Both junior varsity teams will also be in action.

“We are glad that we get to take our JV teams, too,” Holt said. “That will give those kids the experience of running the course before state, because you never know when someone will get injured and need someone to fill in. We also have some kids on JV right now that are close to making it, so we will just see how what happens as the season goes along.”

Both Havre teams will run in Great Falls Friday before returning to Havre next week for the Havre Invitational, which is the Ponies’ only home meet of the season.