Each of the West Genesee cross country teams kept up a busy race schedule in the wake of appearing in the Oct. 16 Salt City Athletic Conference championships.
Three days after the league meet, the Wildcats took part in the Marathon Invitational, where in the boys race Matt Bartolotta proved the fastest runner in the 74-man field.
In a time of 16 minutes, 45.8 seconds, Bartolotta beat out Watkins Glen’s Gabe Planty, who was second in 16:55.7. A few days later, Bartolotta made the announcement that he would run cross country at Le Moyne College next fall.
WG ultimately took fifth place out of 11 seeded teams at Marathon with 119 points, Elmira (73 points) claiming the top spot.
Behind Bartolotta, Peter McMahon made his way to sixth place in 17:27.8. Ewan Moran got 22nd place in 18:45.6, while Joe Parisi was 44th in 19:23.7, just ahead of Ryan McMahon, who posted 19:40.8.
Of the seven seeded girls teams at Marathon, WG finished fourth, with Natalie Buckhout 11th among individuals in a time of 21:05.6.
Lauren Puchta got 15th place in 21:34.2, while Abby Kuppinger, in 22:21.2, was 20th among teams runners and 23rd overall, one spot ahead of Liz Morey, who posted 22:27.9. Rachel Reynolds finished in 25:25.3.
Marcellus also took part in the Marathon Invitational and the girls Mustangs won the Unseeded team competition with 97 points, edging out Jordan-Elbridge, who was second with 102 points.
Among individuals, the Eagles had Vassianna Klock take third place in 21:003, with Coral Uhle eighth in 21:59.6 before the Mustangs’ Alana Bolster made her way to ninth place in 22:09 flat. No other J-E runner was better than Kendall Shaw’s 31stplace finish.
Marcellus pulled ahead by having Meaghan Strempel finish 11th among team runners (14th overall) in 22:24.5, with Sophia Maum in 18th place (23:53.0), Alyssa McShane in 21st place (24:01.6) and Virginia Lucchetti, who in 24:49.8 beat out the 24:52.1 from Amy Francesconi.
The Marcellus boys finished eighth in the seeded boys race as Kevin Huss led the Mustangs by finishing 31st in 19:05.3. Caeden Cox was 41st in 19:21.1, with Aiden Shea 51st in 20:01 flat.
In the unseeded portion of the Manhattan meet, J-E was second with 105 points to Owego’s winning total of 82 points, Sean Dristle pacing the Eagles as he got fourth place in 18:02.
Kenny Williams, in a clocking of 18:40, made his way to 16th place, with Derek Quigley 22nd in 19:02. Colin Jewsbury earned 33rd place in 19:31 as Lee Jewell got to 40th place in 19:39.
After all this, the Marcellus girls had a close meet Monday against Cazenovia, but lost, 27-31, to the Lakers, who claimed the outright OHSL Liberty division regular-season championship.
The Mustangs still had the top two individual efforts as Bolster won in 22:34 and Strempel was second in 22:51.But Cazenovia claimed six of the next seven spots, led by Isla Stover (23:03) in third place, while McShane was sixth in 23:31 and Maum (24:05) was 10th.
