2015 Maryland County XC Championships Coverage Central!

MileSplit Staff

Montgomery County Championships

October 26, 2015 @ Bohrer Park in Gaithersburg, MD

Coverage:

Recap: The Montgomery County Championships may have been moved last second to Monday off their usual Saturday date at Bohrer Park, but the change of date appeared to leave no negative effects on the runners with one of the fastest and deepest years of the meet in recent memory.

Look no further than Walter Johnson sophomore Abbey Green who took down the course record with her 18:04.8 performance on the 5K course in Gaithersburg. Green set the pace early on with her teammate Emily Murphy and Paint Branch's Bethlehem Taye giving chance for the entire race. Green, the top returnee from last year's race when she placed 5th as a freshmen in a time of 18:55.

A 51 second drop from Green in 12 months on this course indicates that she may be ready to challenge the state's top ranked runner Maria Coffin of Annapolis in a few weeks in the 4A state race at Hereford.

Her senior teammate Murphy had an incredible final Montgomery County XC Championships race to clock a new personal best time of 18:12 for second place to help set the tone with Green up front for the rest of her Walter Johnson teammates.

Taye, the outdoor 4A state 3200 meter champ, ran a personal best time of 18:23 for third place. A total of seven girls went under 19 minutes in the varsity race with Wootton's Grace Dellapa barely missing out on joining that group in eighth place at 19:00.8.

Two freshmen were among that sub 19 pack including Bethesda-Chevy Chase's Virginia Brown in fourth place at 18:45 and Poolesville's Nandini Satsangi in seventh place at 18:57. A bright future remains for Montgomery County girls cross country with underclassmen stars like Green, Brown, and Satsangi.

The Walter Johnson girls started out as the team to beat this fall as the reigning 4A state champions as well as Montgomery County champions returning a strong core of their 2014 squad. And they were the team that was getting beaten in the first half of the cross country season taking consecutive losses to county rival Bethesda-Chevy Chase and finishing well back in the field at Oatlands not a full strength with runners missing due to illness or injury.

However, once October rolled around, Coach Tom Martin and his Walter Johnson girls started turning things around with one of their top moments prior to the county meet in winning their varsity letter race at the Manhattan Invitational in New York City a few weeks ago. Their weakness early on was glaring with the back end of their top 5, but turned out to be their strength on Monday in facing arguably the deepest team in the state of Maryland in the MD #1 ranked Bethesda-Chevy Chase girls.

After their 1-2 punch of Green and Murphy, Walter Johnson saw their next group of finishers, 4 to be exact, come through the finish line in a 13 second span from 19:13 to 19:26 in Kati Kirsch (12th, 19:13), Sadie Keller (16th, 19:22), Janet Scott (17th, 19:23), and Jasmine Garrett (18th, 19:26). Big time drops with clutch championship season performers from several in this bunch especially Keller and Scott who had not even broken 21 minutes for 5K prior to this race!

Their victory over Bethseda-Chevy Chase (2nd, 80 pts) was quite resounding by a margin of 32 points averaging 18:51 as a squad at Bohrer Park. Bethesda-Chevy Chase appeared to have a few off races, but definitely some bright spots including the freshmen Brown up front and look to show themselves better against Walter Johnson at the 4A West regional meet next Thursday before their state meet clash. They certainly can't allow Walter Johnson to put six runners ahead of their #3 runner Michaela Peterson and expect to compete for first, but can take a positive takeaway with 6 runners breaking 20 minutes as well as only one senior among the group.

Walter Johnson only has two seniors among their varsity lineup too, so this outstanding rivalry is not going to die any time soon and continue to spill over beyond the county meet for state title races at Hereford.

The Walt Whitman girls finished third overall with 158 points, despite missing their top runner and one of the county's best individuals in Sami King due to injury. Having King certainly would have put the Oatlands Invite champs a lot closer to Bethesda-Chevy Chase to challenge for second place.

While no course record in the boys race, Rohann Asfaw did make history in becoming the first individual champion from Richard Montgomery since 1995 with sizzling personal best 5K performance of 15:34 at the Montgomery County Championships. Only a junior, Asfaw certainly has the opportunity to go after that 15:24 county course meet record next fall.

Undefeated against county competition this fall and his only loss of the season coming in a fourth place finish at a loaded Oatlands Invite, Asfaw had the target on his back as the man to beat in arguably one of the deepest and most competitive counties in the state, yet delivered decisively with a 16 second victory. After Asfaw's county race, real consideration has to be given to Asfaw as a state title contender in 4A despite how impressive Dulaney's Eric Walz has looked throughout the season.

Northwood's Michael Abebe came on top in the end from the chase pack for runner-up honors and first sub 16 minute race in 15:50. Abebe is one of the fastest returnees from last year's state meet, but somehow had yet to find an opportunity to turn in a race performance under 16 minutes prior to the county meet. Moving up to 4A this fall with his Northwood squad, Abebe hopes to be closer to Asfaw and rest of top 4A individuals in a couple weeks at the state meet.

Branson Oduor of Northwest, competing in his first and only Montgomery County Championships as a senior, made quite a debut racing against the county's best in cross country with a fourth place PR effort of 15:58.

Meanwhile, Mitchell Welter of Winston Churchill may have been one of the biggest surprises among the individual finishers chopping 45 seconds off his 5K PR to dip just under 16 minutes to lead his squad with a fifth place finish of 15:59.

History was definitely made with the boys team title in going to the Thomas S. Wootton squad for the first time in their program's history. Their team had established themselves as the favorites with an unblemished regular season record as well as being the county's top performing squad in one of the best invitational collections of the Montgomery County's best at the DCXC Invite.

Coach Kellie Redmond and her boys team had finished back in fifth place year ago, while also graduating several of their top runners. However, the 2014 Wootton squad at the county championships was missing Colin Sybing due to injury and he certainly made his impact healthy this year in grabbing third place individually on Monday in a 15:55 5K PR.

Wootton had two more runners finish among the top 10, which made them the only team with that kind of firepower up front in Cliff Tilley (6th, 16:02) and Jacob Rushkoff (9th, 16:13) finishing ahead of many other teams' #1 runners.

John Riker, only a freshmen in 21st place (16:44), and junior Benjamin Shapiro (34th, 16:55) rounded out the team scoring for Wootton to give them a total score of 73 points, which was 21 points better than the runners-up from Bethesda-Chevy Chase.

A pair of runner-up finishes on the day for Coach Chad Young and the Bethesda-Chevy Chase which certainly should not be viewed as a disappoint considering how deep and competitive that Montgomery County is. The B-CC boys not only had to contest with Wootton, but also had to worry about Winston Churchill (3rd, 108 pts) and Northwest (4th, 119 pts) breathing down their necks. Bethesda-Chevy Chase had the best top 5 spread among all schools in 32 seconds with all under 17 minutes ranging from 16:20 to 16:52.

Rankings:

Schedule:

2:45 Girls 9-10
3:15 Boys 9-10
3:45 Girls A
4:15 Boys A
4:45 Boys 11-12
5:15 Girls 11-12
5:45 Awards and G-burg Rec. race

Course Map:

Schools:

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