Mount Si cross country closes out regular season with strong efforts

Despite rain, several runners see great results; Team is in excellent postseason position

By Rhett Workman • October 15, 2009 8:28 pm
Christian Dewey leads a stream of Mount Si runners
Christian Dewey leads a stream of Mount Si runners

Mount Si’s boys and girls cross country teams braved the rain on Wednesday, Oct. 14, for their final regular season meet. Strong efforts put Wildcat runners in a good position going into the postseason.

The team traveled to Island Crest Park on Mercer Island to take on the Islanders. Mount Si girls saw some very solid results, with four athletes finishing in the top 10. That group was led by senior Alex Rudd, who finished third, running the woody park course in 19 minutes, 35 seconds. Right behind Mount Si’s top runner was sophomore teammate Kendall Maddux, who finished fourth with a time of 19:44. Following those two were senior Megan Past, who ran the course in a time of 20:30 to take sixth, and freshman Christina Volken, who finished ninth overall with a time of 21:19. Jessareh Helm also had a solid run for the Wildcat ladies; the senior missed out on a top 10 finish, earning 11th overall with a time of 21:38.

Mount Si’s boys were missing top senior Zac Pearlstein, likely handling school-related matters related to homecoming — Pearlstein is the school’s student body president. That didn’t stop a strong effort for the boys. Michael Blackmon took fourth overall to lead the Wildcat men with a time of 16:58. Behind the junior were a slew of runners, finishing one right behind another from 11th to 17th places for Mount Si. Those included freshman Joe Williams (17:59, 11th), sophomore Ben Houldridge (18:13, 12th), freshmen Christian Dewey (18:15, 13th) and Alex Censullo (18:16, 14th), senior Brett Duncan (18:17, 15th), and sophomores Richard Carmichael (18:20, 16th) and Ryan Olson (18:26, 17th).

All of these runners will likely be competing in postseason meets, which begin this Thursday with the Kingco league meet at Lake Sammamish State Park in Issaquah, and continue next Thursday with the SeaKing district meet, also at Lake Sammamish State Park. Should any runners advance past both of these events, they will be running Saturday, Nov. 7, at the state meet in Pasco.

Rudd is likely to be there, and, based on some of the performances from this season, Pearlstein, Maddux, Williams and Blackmon have a chance to join her in the Tri-Cities.

League action begins at 1:45 p.m.Thursday, Oct. 22, with the boys race; the girls race follows at 3:15 p.m. An awards ceremony completes the activity at 5 p.m.