The Montoya's

Socorro Stampede XC Race is in the books...

Seems like not that long ago the idea popped into my head that we should have a XC race here in Socorro. We needed to have one here to help promote Socorro XC and to give our friends, families and supporters a chance to see us in action and to see what XC is all about. We had our meet last Friday at the NM Tech golf course. As you can see from the pictures, it's a beautiful setting. Mike came down and was a huge help in getting the course ready. I really could not have done it without him.

We did a 2 loop, 3 mile course using grass, dirt and some cart paths. We even threw in a hay bale section that I think was a big success. We had 5 schools, 4 high school races, and an open race. From what I have been hearing, I think it was fun, well-organized, and challenging.

The girls record is now set at 20:27 and the boys at an amazing 16:06. Our girls finished second to 5A Los Lunas and our boys, despite having their best meet yet, finished a close 5th. The boys side of things was pretty stacked as we had Los Lunas, Valencia, Grants, and Pecos racing. The girls are continuing to do great and are starting to get some attention on the state level. Unfortunately, we will not have the help of our 4 soccer girls for the next 3 weeks as they will have soccer games on the next 3 Saturdays.

The boys had a meet best 7 runners break :20. That number is also our team record, bettering our previous best of 5. To put things in perspective, it took us 4 weeks into the season last year to get one kid to break :20 and the best we ever had last year was three. We also had a meet best pack time of 1:29. Eight of the fifteen boys running ran PB's, and five out of the nine girls running had PB's. We had three boys running 18:XX and two girls running 21:XX.

The results, time wise and meet wise, are encouraging and it lets me know we are doing things right. We are getting faster, Socorro XC is supported, we were able to host a great meet for kids and coaches, and we are are on the right path.

Thanks to Mike and all of the volunteers that came out to help make the Stampede a success.