The Nocona Lady Indians claimed a ninth-place team finish out of a whopping 39 teams in the Arl Houston Ken Gaston 22nd Annual Invitational Cross Country Meet in Grand Prairie on Thursday.
With 294 points, the Lady Indians also landed in second place in the 3A division led by top individual Maria Hernandez, who medaled in the meet with a 19th place finish and time of 12:57.6.
Kylie Rose was just out of medal reach with a time or 13:03.5 in 22nd place, while Raylee Sparkman crossed the finish line at 13:25.1. It was another successful meet for the Lady Indians as they competed against more than 250 individual runners.
Nocona Lady Indians Cross Country Coach Kyle Spitzer feels the strong finish in such a large meet provided some confidence for his runners with all but two of his athletes finishing with their fastest time of the year.
“These girls expect a lot of themselves,” said Spitzer. “It’s been fun to watch the excitement they have for the team success as opposed to just individual success. I knew I was going to have a talented group of runners, but we have to keep putting in the work if we want to reach our goals. It won’t be easy, but I know these girls are up for the challenge.”
Meanwhile, the Nocona Indians raced to a 30th place team finish out of 37 teams and 280 individual runners in the 4A and under race.
Tyler Richards set the pace for the Indians, finishing in 164th place with a time of 21:067, followed by Lyndon Fenoglio with a time of 21:47.3 and Hank Ulbig who crossed the finish line with a time of 21:48.6.
“I ran some new kids this week, due to injuries,” explained Nocona Indians Cross Country Coach Colby Schniederjan . “We are continuing to make improvements on strategy and our speed. We have one more practice race to prepare for district.”

To see the full list of results, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.