Blue Pony cross country comes home for Havre Invite

After two meets on the road to start the season, the Havre High cross country team is ready to compete in front of their home crowd at the Havre Invite at the Prairie Farms Golf Course this Saturday. The Blue Ponies will face many tough teams at the meet, but HHS head coach Erin Lynch is confident her team can have a strong showing this weekend.

"With how our kids have been making gains in their races the last few weeks and how they've been performing in practice this week, I think we're looking pretty strong," Lynch said. "All those teams present a challenge but if the kids stick to their race plans, they're going to be pretty successful."

Lynch believes the toughest teams on the boys side this weekend will be Glasgow and Browning. On the girls side, she believes Lewistown will be the Ponies' toughest competition. Other teams that will run this weekend include Belt/Centerville, Box Elder, Cascade, Dodson, Fairfield, Fort Benton, Great Falls Central Catholic, Harlem, Malta, Sunburst, Plentywood, Rocky Boy, Scobey, Shelby, Whitewater and Wolf Point.

One HHS runner looking to continue his strong start to the season is sophomore Caleb Tomac. In his first two meets this fall, Tomac has won both boys meets with times of 17:43.4 and 17:46. In the Hardin Invitational last weekend, Tomac beat five of the top 12 runners in the state. Lynch expects even tougher competition for Tomac this weekend but she expects him to run hard.

"Caleb put in a lot of work preseason and it's definitely showing right now," Lynch said. "This weekend, there is going to be three other runners that are performing at that same level as Caleb, so we're going to have a good race on our hands."

Many other runners on the HHS boys team will look for success this weekend. Brody Henry will try to repeat his success from the Browning Invite where he finished fourth with a time of 19:30.3. Zack May will also attempt to repeat his performance in Browning where he placed fifth.

The HHS girls team also has several strong runners looking to finish high this weekend. Freshman Hailey Gingery has had a solid start to the season after placing fourth at the Browning Invite and tenth at the Hardin Invitational. At the Browning Invite, Emma Gillen finished fifth so she will be looking for a repeat of that performance this weekend.

The Havre Invite this weekend will be the only time the Ponies compete in Havre this season. With this being the only opportunity for the Havre community to see the cross country team in action, Lynch expects plenty of support this Saturday.

"It's absolutely fantastic when we have parents that are able to come and watch us when we're traveling but for this home meet, it'll be nice to have that hometown support," Lynch said.

The HHS girls cross country meet will start at 10 a.m. on Saturday at Prairie Farms Golf Course and the HHS boys cross country meet will begin at 11 a.m.