Sumner’s girls set record

The Corona del Mar High girls cross country team, with all five

runners finishing in the top 20, took first place at the Clovis

invitational at Woodward Park in Fresno Saturday.

In the process, the Sea Kings set a course record, clocking in

with a time of 91 minutes, 21 seconds, smashing Sultana’s 2002 mark

of 91:53.

“I was shocked when I found out we broke the course record,

because I know the history of this course -- we’ve been here for the

state championships 18 years in a row,” Corona del Mar Coach Bill

Sumner said. “A lot of great teams have run this course.”

Corona del Mar finished with 36 points, well ahead of second-place

Buchanan (66), which defeated the Sea Kings a week ago at the

Stanford invitational. Saturday, Buchanan, the No. 1-ranked team in California, clocked in at 93:58, more than two minutes behind Corona

del Mar.

“When you do something this big, I don’t know where you go from

here,” Sumner said. “Buchanan was blowing people away. But we stuck

to our plan.”

And what was this master plan?

“Our plan was to race Buchanan and pretend no one else was there,”

Sumner said. “We matched up with them toe to toe and we ran the

second half of the race like USC plays the second half of football

games.”

Annie St. Geme led the way with a second-place time of 17:24,

Sarah Cummings took fifth place at 18:10 and Shelby Buckley finished

sixth at 18:14. Rounding out Corona del Mar’s top five was Allison

Damon with a ninth-place time of 18:33 and Nichole Slykhous with a

16th-place time of 19:00.

“When four girls finish in the top 10, wow,” Sumner said. “I don’t

know where you go from here, but we’ll still strive to get better.”

The Sea King boys had a stellar showing as well, taking second

place overall with 123 points, trailing only first-place Oak Ridge

(84).

Jack Turner led the way with a sixth-place time of 16:25, Tim

Scott took 13th at 16:35 and Ryan Guthrie clocked in at 16:47, good

for 25th place. Rounding out the top five was Paris Salgado with a

28th-place time of 16:52 and Brian Licorish with a 51st-place time of

17:11.