The Bowie boy’s cross country team finished second at the district cross country meet at Holliday on a dreary Monday morning.
It was the program’s second straight district runner-up finish and will also make it the fifth year in a row to qualify for the regional meet.
They faced a stacked Holliday team made up of freshman that almost all finished in the top 10 and easily won first place. Henrietta was the other challenger and had two runners finish in the top 10.
Despite the Jackrabbits’ top runner Nathan Rodgers, who finished fourth overall with a time of 17:40, being the only runner to finish in the top 10 it was the strength of how consistently the next four Bowie runners finished which led to a second place finish.
James Fitch ended up just outside the top 10 in 11th place with a time of 18:36. Liam Pearson, Monte Mayfield and Ryder McChesney then finished 14th, 15th and 16th to complete the Jackrabbit’s scoring.
Though their points did not count towards the team’s total, the sixth and seventh runners were also running close together only a few spots back as Alex Castro and Ethan Malone finished 19th and 20th.
In the girl’s race before only Jojo Villarreal represented Bowie. She finished 28th overall with a time of 14:57 in the seniors final cross country race.
The junior varsity runners ran in the same race as the varsity in both and Bowie had half of the eight participants in the boy’s race. Jax Williams, Gavin Catano and Kaz Williams finished first, second and third among JV runners. Austin Jones then finished seventh.
Coach Andy Atkins was pleased overall with what he saw from his runners as they ran like they have been all season.
“Holliday is really good and we knew that coming in so we didn’t worry about that,” Atkins said. “We just wanted to run our race. I knew if we did then beating everyone else was well within reach. We did that and we actually ran really well. This is three years in a row of getting district champs or runners-up so I think we are doing pretty well. We are excited for regionals in a couple of weeks.
The regional meet is scheduled for Oct. 25 at Mae Simmons Park in Lubbock. The team will have to finish among the top three or an individual will need to finish among the top 10 to qualify for the state meet.

To see times for all Bowie runners along with more pictures, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.