2014 Cross Country Schedule is posted HERE

Well the 2013 CC season has reached the finish line.
It has been an exciting year in itself but speaks of great things for coming seasons!

The State Meet itself was quite the challenge for our runners.
Senior, Anthony Parameswaran missed his PR time by just 20 seconds but that was still good enough to finish 19th. An improvement over last years 42nd place finish. Anthony certainly leaves his mark behind as he owns the Sparkman School Record in the Boys 5k!

Sophmore Bailey Herfurth’s first appearance at the State Meet showed that he will be someone to contend with in the coming seasons. He finished 85th out of the 206 competitors, 31 seconds off his best time and (for reasons as yet unexplained to me) got a bloody nose!

8th grader, Renita Vander Schaaf came within 5 seconds of a new PR and finishing 74th and closes out the year owning the School Record in the 2 mile, 2.1 mile and the 3200m!

It didn’t quite seem to be Junior, Kelsey Johnson’s day. Her time was off her best mark by over a minute, leaving her with a 136th place finish. On the positive side though, she DOES currently own the Sparkman School Record for the Girl’s 5k and she DOES get to come back next year for another run at state!

7th grader Emilia Poole was one of ONLY 8 seventh graders who made it to state! Though she was about 40 seconds off her PR time for the 5K, she finished 143rd of the 199 runners. This was only the third time she had competed in this event at the High School VARSITY level. She finishes the season as the 6th ranked 6A, 7th grader for the 5k in the state.

So everyone can take the week off but then … Next season is just 9 short months away!

(10th)Bailey Herfurth,(12th) Anthony Parameswaran, (12)Kelsey Johnson, (8th)Renita Vander Schaaf, (7th)Emilia Poole.

Full Results from Section Meet listed here.

It was a tough meet for our Cross Country squads but several of our athletes rose to the challenge.

For the Boys, 12th grader Anthony Parameswaran again turned in a solid performance and showed why he is one of the top runners in the state. Anthony finished 4th in a race that showed less than 30 seconds between him and a win! This will be Anthony’s 2nd trip to the State CC Meet.

Sophmore Bailey Herfurth also proved himself in this meet. This is Bailey’s 3rd section meet and this time he finished 12th, earning himself a trip to State and one more opportunity to put a new record in the books for this year.

Over all, our boys team finished 6th.

The Girls also showed themselves worthy of the challenge qualifying THREE athletes for the State Meet!

For the 2nd year in a row, 8th Grader Renita Vander Schaaf was our top girl’s qualifier in the 5k. Renita finished 15th with a time that was a minute and 15 seconds faster than her qualifying run last year.

Junior Kelsey Johnson will also be making a return trip to the State! Kelsy improved last year’s qualifying mark by 34 seconds and finished 17th, just 18 seconds back from her team mate.

Our new girl’s qualifier for this year is 7th grade phenome Emilia Poole.
This was only the second time Emilia had competed in the 5k and she dug deep to bettered her PR by a minute and seven seconds, finishing 18th and earning herself a start at State!

Good solid performance by freshman Brooklynne Gallimore, and 7th grader Mary-Frances Burch, helped to take the girls to a 4th place team finish! This was just 9 points out of 3rd place and a huge difference from last year when we did not have enough varsity girls entered to be given any team points.

Appart from Emilia two more of our Senator runners finished out their season in style, digging deep and coming up with NEW Personal Records!

• Brooklynne Gallimore, improved her best time by 14 seconds and
• 7th grader Vasquez, Isaiah improved his by 9 seconds.

Now it is on to the State Championships!
This Saturday, November 09, at Oakville Indian Mounds Park in Oakville, AL

It was the final “regular” season Cross Country meet of the year and our Senator runners ended with authority!

Boys and Girls CC teams with their 1st and 2nd place trophies

All our Girls ran the 5K, for some it was their first race at that distance!

Renita Vander Schaaf led the way, setting a NEW PR for that distance and scoring a personal 5th Place over all ! Kelsey Johnson also had a top 10 run, finishing with a personal 8th Place over all.

Together the girls finish strong, scoring a TEAM 2nd PLACE in the 4a-5a division. They were ONLY 8 POINTS out of first place!

All our Boys also entered the 5K and the results were even stronger! Bringing home a FIRST PLACE TEAM FINISH !!!

Anthony Parameswaran finished with an over-all personal 1st PLACE !!
Jake Russell took an over-all 7th Place and Bailey Herfurth took 9TH PLACE.

Sophomore Brandon Curry also stepped it up and turned in a NEW PR for this distance.

Complete results can be found by clicking here.

The Metro meet turned out to be very tough competition AND terrain!

For the Girls it was Renita Vander Schaaf once again leading the way. Her individual 3rd Place Finish helped the JV GIRLS secure a 3rd PLACE TEAM finish!

For the Varsity Boys, Anthony Parameswaran finished with an individual 5th and Bailey Herfurth scored an individual 10th!

Complete team and individual results can be found HERE.

The Jessie Owens Classic is billed as one of the biggest and toughest meets of the year and the 2013 edition lived up to it’s hype. Still, we had several athletes including the entire JV Boys team who rose to the challenge! (for complete SHS results, click here)

With well over 200 teams and at least 3756 athletes with recorded times, this was tough meet.
For the Girls Varsity team we are still hampered by not having enough girls entered, to qualify for team points.
Once again Junior, Kelsey Johnson led the way, followed by Sophomores Lauren Reza and Kaitlyn Williams.

The Boys Varsity team was once again led by Anthony Parameswaran who finished 51st out the 320 runners in the “Gold” 5k division. Anthony was not quite on his game, as his PR time would have given him a 13 place finish but to give you some idea of the strength of this field – NO varsity runner from North Alabama finished within the top 15 and only 4 finished in the top 50.

The Girls JV team put up another good showing, finishing just outside the top 10, in 12th place.
8th grader Renita Vander Schaaf once again led the team, finishing 26th out of the 362 runners. Renita was slightly off of her best pace for this distance which would have only moved her up to a 20th place finish. Only 3 girls from North Alabama finished in front of her.
Perhaps our best JV Girls performance of the day came from 9th grader Hailey Brown who stepped it up and turned in A NEW PR for the 2.1 mile distance!

The Boys JV team really turned it on for this meet.
We had TWO 9th grade runners who beat the School Record for the 2.1 mile but alas, there can be only one record holder and that honor goes to Jake Russell who finished with an individual 6th. Harrison Miller who now holds the 2nd fastest time in school history scored an individual 10th place to go with his PR run.
In fact all but one of our JV boys set NEW PR’s in this 2.1 mile race, a major factor in their 9th place team finish.
Scoring NEW PR’s were 7th graders John-David Ray, Isaiah Vasquez, Riley Edwards and 8th graders Michael Fulda and Jake Maier.

Good job Senators!

It was another great showing by Sparkman runners at the

Randolph School Cross Country Classic!

Boys JV 2 mile

(click here for full results)

Both our Boys AND Girls JV teams PLACED 3RD and we had 3 JV runners finish with individual medals including 9th grader Jake Russell who WON the Boys 2 mile!
Jake came with in 10 seconds of breaking his old school record for this distance!

9th grader Harrison Miller’s 3rd Place finish was also a great performance and amazing in that he TIED his old PR for the 2 mile. How you run 2 miles over hill and dale and through water and manage to match an old time to the 100th of a second is beyond me!

Fellow 9th grader Steven Underwood also had a good run, turning in a PR time for this distance.

For the JV Girls, Renita Vander Schaaf was again on the podium with a 3rd Place finish and a new PR.
Fellow 8th grader Savanah Wilson also ran a new PR for this distance.

For the Varsity Girls, 11th grader Kelsey Johnson led the way to a team finish of 6th. Kelsey finished just outside the top 10 (11th) but turned in a PR performance in this, her third 5k race.

The Varsity boys also turned in a solid performance.
Our squad of 10th graders finished with a team place of 11th.