Graham Bazell is getting pretty good at making first impressions.

For the second straight year at the Howard County Invitational, this time in a steady downpour Sept. 12, the Atholton senior easily distanced himself from the competition and, along the way, set a personal-best time for the initial race of the fall.

"You always want to start out strong, set the tone for the rest of the year," said Bazell after crossing the line in 16 minutes, 21.88 seconds, which was 19 seconds better than his winning time last year. "It's especially important for me this year, being a senior. This is my last chance to leave an impression on the rest of the running community."

Bazell wasn't the only one from the county to turn heads, though. The River Hill girls and Mt. Hebron boys both ran their way to relatively easy victories in the team competitions, marking the second straight year for a county sweep.

River Hill ended up scoring 35 points, placing all five of its scorers in the top 12 and beating second place Century by 32 points. Mt. Hebron scored 66 points, with five runners placing 22nd or better to finish 28 points ahead of Atholton. For full results, see High School Wrap-Up.

Bazell made it clear from the beginning of the boys race that he wasn't going to leave any doubt about who the winner would be. His first mile split was just under five minutes, faster than even he had expected.

"There were a little bit of nerves, first race of the season and wanting to get out and away from everyone else," Bazell said. "I certainly didn't plan to go out as fast as I did ... I actually didn't have a race plan at all. I kind of adapted as I went."

Bazell ended up cruising the rest of the way, eventually beating his nearest competitor, teammate Michael Lynch, by 27 seconds. The winning time was his second fastest ever on the Centennial course, only behind his effort of 16:16 at the regional meet last year.

Lynch's second-place effort was nearly as impressive, especially when you consider how much time he's shaved since last fall. His time of 16:48.27 was one minute and 16 seconds faster than in the Invitational last year and more than 30 seconds faster than he had ever previously posted at Centennial.

"I wasn't even sure if Michael was going to run today, his back has been bothering him, but he really gutted it out," Atholton coach Mike Babe said. "He's been doing an incredible amount of mileage, a lot of it with Graham, to get himself ready for this season."

Even with the one-two punch at the top, though, Atholton (94 points) didn't have quite enough to knock off Mt. Hebron.

The Vikings, led by Constantine Matsakis finishing sixth in a time of 17:31, did a great job of bunching runners. Zach Weinstein (eighth place) and Ryan Steinbach (tenth) were both within 17 seconds of Matsakis, while Russell Buescher (20th) and Karthik Venkatraman (22nd) finished two seconds apart.

"We knew before today that we were really deep and that it would be our strength ... and for us it goes beyond the seven varsity guys," said coach Todd DeCrispino, referring his team also convincingly winning the B race. "The guys understand you don't necessarily need that elite runner when you have a bunch of guys who are very strong. It's almost like they work together to get into the positions we need to win."

River Hill, led by Craig Morgan (third) and Sean Kirby (fifth), finished third with 101 points, with Glenelg taking fourth with 135.

The girls race saw Century's Maura Linde win in a time of 19:38.70, going practically unchallenged with River Hill's Katie Harman (sixth) hampered by a heel injury and Howard's Elyse Borisko sitting out the race.

Instead it was River Hill's Anna Demaree (20:07.79) and Glenelg Country's Maeve Ricaurte (20:12.36) who provided the closest competition and an exciting race for second.

Demaree's effort, which was nearly two minutes better than her first race last year, also provided the springboard for River Hill's dominance in the team competition. Harman was four spots behind her sophomore teammate with a time of 20:52.48, Payton Lawrence was eighth, Kelsey Harman 10th and Kendall Auth 13th.

In comparison, no other team had three runners cross the line before River Hill's fifth.

"Katie's nursing her heel a little, she didn't go all out, but regardless, we have enough kids this year that we didn't miss a beat," River Hill coach Earl Lauer said. "The times were good, the first five were under 22 (minutes). Last year, our third came in at over 24, so obviously its a tremendous improvement."

Century finished second with 67 points, while Mt. Hebron was third with 99. The Vikings' Becky Yep ran a strong race to finish fourth overall in a time of 20:18.04 and lead her team, which had its top five runners in the top 30.

Centennial's Olivia Joseph (ninth) was the only other county runner to finish in the top 10.

user comments (0)