We are racing at Warrior Lincoln Park instead of Air Academy in 2025.

2024 Results

Cody Jones wrote an excellent article for the Summit Daily: Summit cross-country teams earn podium finishes at final regular season meet

I like to race at one new meet every year for variety – in courses and in competition. We chose the Air Academy meet this year after Rifle moved their meet a week earlier, just 4 days after the Summit Stinger. Air Academy fit the bill because the date prevented too long of a gap between the Summit Stinger and Regionals. It also promised to have strong competition with Colorado Springs area teams that we normally don't see much until State.

On the girls side, that competition certainly included the 5A Air Academy team, the #3 team in the nation by some polls. More pertinent, competition with highly ranked 4A teams Cheyenne Mountain and Discovery Canyon. Based on season best times, Cheyenne Mountain was favored with us edging Discovery Canyon by one point. I thought Cheyenne Mountains times were "padded" by running a fast race at sea-level in Portland. If we raced well, I thought the girls could beat both C.M. and Discovery. The girls raced great, beating both 4A rivals by relatively large margins. The depth of our team was really on display as Lily, Sophie and Avery finished one after another in 16th, 17th and 18th. Ashley closed out our scoring in a strong 29th place. Milla got "flat tired" (the back of her shoe stepped on and pulled off her foot) at the beginning of the race but ran up with the other girls for a mile or so before a couple slow "pit stops" to get her shoe back on properly. Otherwise, all indications are she would have been right up there with the other girls. Iyla was the one who accidentally flat-tired Milla and her resulting fall banged up her knee and threw off her race as well.

The Air Academy boys' team isn't nearly as strong as their girls (last year's national champions), but we did face strong 4A competition, primarily from nationally ranked Cheyenne Mountain but potentially from others including Lutheran, Lewis-Palmer and Central Grand Junction. They boys also raced phenomenally, and also showed our great depth, with Lukas closing out our scoring in an excellent 22nd place. I thought we would give 4A #1 ranked Cheyenne Mountain a run if we raced well. We did. Unfortunately four of Cheyenne Mountain's top seven runners were out with illness, so we didn't get a true picture of our competitiveness. The combination of excellent front-running by Josh and Jay and our depth led to a dominating victory of nearly 50 points over our nearest rivals.

The quality and depth of our team was further displayed by the wonderful performance of our JV teams. The D2/JV division included the varsity teams of smaller schools along with the JV of the D1 schools. The girls placed an excellent 5th, while the boys placed 3rd, just missing out on our 3rd trophy of the meet by five points. That was without several of our strong runners.

All in all it was an excellent meet and a strong indicator of our competitiveness. It confirmed my belief that both the boys and girls will be strong competitors at State, with high likelihood of placing the highest in SHS history.

More great photos!

Full results.

Virtual Meet Projections

I ran numbers to create "virtual meets". The first unadjusted and the second based a bit more on hunches, hopefully more accurate. For the most part, my adjustments were closer to the actual scores. 

The first screenshots are unadjusted - based on raw 2024 best times. The second screenshots are with my adjustments, really just educated guesses, for short courses.

WHEN:  Saturday, 12 October 2024

WHERE:  Air Academy High School, 6910 Carlton Drive, USAFA CO 80840

TRANSPORTATION: Show time at SHS is 5:10 a.m. Bus Departs at 5:15. 2:15 drive time.

Gate Information: All traffic will need to use the South entrance to the Academy (Academy Blvd). Individuals must have photo-id, vehicle registration, and proof of insurance. Anyone accessing the base is subject to vehicle search at all times. Tell Security Forces you are attending an athletic event at Air Academy High School. Abiding the speed limits is necessary! They are very strict and don’t take kindly to a speeding influx of traffic! Don’t make yourself more late to the meet!

Parking: Cars are encouraged to park in the lot North of the school (student lot). This is a massive parking lot and it is the first lot on your left as you enter the Air Academy High School grounds.

Spectator Information: The Kadet XC Course is a great spectator course! Tons of places where you can see the athletes multiple times during the race and catch all the action! Spectators need to stay out of roped off areas near the stadium and absolutely no dogs allowed on the Air Academy Campus except for Service Animals. All spectators, coaches and athletes who are not finishing a race are not allowed on the football field.

RACE TIMES:

• 8:30     Coach meeting

• 9:00     Girls Division 1 Varsity  (4A/5A schools varsity) Run 9, Score 5. 

• 9:35      Boys Division 1 Varsity  (4A/5A schools varsity) Run 9, Score 5.

• 10:10    Girls Division 2*  (4A/5A JV and 2A/3A teams)  Unlimited Entries, 7 is displacement limit 

• 10:45    Boys Division 2*  (4A/5A JV and 2A/3A teams) Unlimited Entries, 7 is displacement limit 

• 11:20    Middle School Division- 1 race of 1.5 miles. All 6-8th graders race together. 

• 12:00    Awards

SCORING:

• Varsity - Run 9, Score 5

• JV - Run unlimited, Score 5

Course Records: (established this course in 2018)

• Bethany Michalak 16:48 2023

• Matthew Edwards 15:20 2023

SHS HISTORY: This will be our first time competing in the Air Academy XC meet.

course Map

The course is a 2 loop, European-style classic XC course! It is a combination of grass, turf, dirt, gravel and a 100m stretch of pavement (run twice).

Race virtual meet

Top seeded racers

Top seeded entries. The full list of entries is here.

Last year's top 20 times