Blue Pony harriers ready to run

The Havre High cross country teams were going to have a new head coach this fall. But circumstances change and a familiar face will once again be leading the Blue Pony runners.

The Blue Ponies expected last season to be the final one with Josh Holt as the head coach, but following a string of unforeseen circumstances, Holt has agreed to return to coach both HHS cross country teams once again.

"I will be back for at least one more year," Holt said over the phone recently. "I got a job at BNSF and that wasn't going to allow me to coach. But then I was put on furlough and that opened up some things up. The position opened up and Mr. Murphy asked if I was interested and it became official with the school board."

While a replacement for Holt was in place, his former assistant ended up being unable to coach this school year and that left the Ponies looking for a new head coach and thankfully, circumstances allowed Holt to return for a fifth season.

And that season starts with Friday's Cut bank Time Trial.

"I am looking forward to it," Holt said. "We don't have the numbers that we have had in the past and I do feel a little behind schedule because normally, we are training and preparing for about 10 months. This year, I didn't do that because I didn't expect to be coaching again. A lot of the kids worked really hard during the offseason and as much as I might feel like we have some catching up to do, in the grand scheme of things, I think we are right where we should be at this point."

Junior Tamera O'Leary will be back for the Ponies and she is fresh off a 28th-place finish last season. She will join Emma Gillen and Hannah Haslem as other top runners for the varsity team. Grace Loftus is another experienced runner for the Ponies.

"As far as the girls, it's going to be a bit of a building year," Holt said. "We only have about six girls out right now and that's going to be our varsity team. Hopefully, we can build with these young kids."

As far as the Havre boys are concerned, numbers aren't a concern as the number of participants is well into double figures. The Ponies will be without Jakob Keller, who was a varsity runner for four years and also Noah Azure, however, behind Dylan Young and Cameron Pleninger, there is plenty of potential.

"Dylan is looking really good," Holt said. "He has put in a lot of time in and he has really been strong. He is looking to be a little more consistent this season."

Young also had a strong finish at state last season, finishing 32nd with a time of 17:51. Cameron Pleninger and Sidney Moffitt, who finished 58th and 72nd respectively at state will also be back for the Ponies. Kendall Pleninger, who also competed at state, will be competing for a varsity spot again this season along with Riley Pleninger and Ethan Durward.

Other runners out for cross country this fall include, Brigham Blackwell, Brody Henry, Carson Sandstrom, Chloe Shennum, Gabriel Stevens, Jacob Miller, Josh Currie, Laiviah Pratt, Lilly Tally, Paul Bartlett, Rhoda Peterson, Savannah Stewart, Sid Moffitt, Trenton Varney and Willie Lasmith.

As they have done for years, the Ponies will finalize their varsity teams in Cut Bank. Other notable competitions for Havre this season include the Mountain West Classic in Missoula on Sept. 28 and also the Helena 7-on-7 preview meet Oct. 10. The Eastern A Fall Classic will be held in Billings Oct. 18 and the All-Class state meet will take place in Great Falls Oct. 26.

After hosting the Fall Classic in 2018, Havre will be back to just one home cross country meet in 2019 and that will be the Havre Invitational set for Oct. 5.