For each of the West Genesee cross country teams, the big event of the week took place Saturday, when they went to Rochester’s Genesee Valley Park for the prestigious McQuaid Invitational.
As such, some of the Wildcats’ runners, including Laura Leff, were out for last Wednesday’s league meet against Central Square, but it didn’t matter as the girls side won by a big margin of 15-46 and WG’s boys also prevailed over the Red Hawks 17-43.
Lindsay Weaver pulled away from the girls field and won her race in 21 minutes, 5.9 seconds, leading a top-five sweep from the Wildcats.
Elise Dunshee finished second, in 21:30.2, while Eva Young made her way to third place in 21:33.1. Sara Ferranti finished fourth in 21:41.5 as Alycia Andolina, in 21:57.5, finished fifth. Annie Baker was eighth in 22:34.1 as Megan Hannahan (22:58.4) got into the top 10, too.
In the boys race, WG claimed each of the top four positions, led by Nate Conroy, whose time of 17:01.4 put him 3.8 seconds ahead of runner-up Mike Lannon.
Jack Erhard finished third, in 17:15.9, while Will Randall made his way to fourth place in 17:17.2. Further away, Matt Romano got to seventh place, in 18:05.4, while Ethan Osborne was eighth in 18:15.3 and Logan McAnulty (18:24.4) rounded out the top 10.
When they went to the McQuaid meet, Leff set out in the Varsity AAA meet and stayed among the top contenders, finishing in 17 minutes, 56 seconds to get seventh place as Penfield’s Katie Lembo won in 16:56.
Weaver also ran well, getting to 18th place in 18:33, but none of the other Wildcats were as quick, leaving them in 12th place in a 13-team field.
In the boys AAA race, West Genesee climbed to ninth place out of 16 teams, with 245 points, led by Strickland, who finished 31st in 15:53, just one second ahead of Conroy (15:54) in 33rd place. Osborne finished 33rd in 16:11.
