by David Thomsen

On Monday, Oct. 6, the Atlantic boys and girls cross country teams traveled to Shenandoah for their meet.  This is the first year the teams ran in Shenandoah, because it replaced running in Perry.  Both the varsity and JV squads ran for both boys and girls, but the Atlantic Middle School team did not make the trip due to the race restrictions placed on middle school teams.

Starting off the meet for the Trojans was the JV boys team.  Junior William Weppler led all JV Trojans by finishing in sixth place with a time of 19:45.  Following Weppler was freshman Kole Schmitt finishing with 20:41 in 27 place.  Rounding out the top five finishers for the Trojans were freshmen Tanner Steffens and Kalob Flory, as well as sophomore Caleb Williams, who sealed the fifth place finish out of eight teams in the meet.

Immediately after was the junior varsity girls, who finished in sixth place out of seven teams.  Leading the girls was senior Karly Monson who has been battling an injury all season.  Monson finished in fourth place with a time of 18:07.  Following her was sophomore Lexi Freund in 14 place with a time of 18:41.

Next, the varsity girls squad got their chance to run.  Finishing in first place was junior Tiffany Williams who won the girls race in 15:02.  Following Williams was senior Ashleigh Waltz and freshman Alexis Brockman who finished in 16:40 and 17:05 respectively.  These finishes were enough to land the girls third place.

After the girls came the varsity boys which had 2 Trojans finishing in the top 15 overall.  Junior Ryan Hawkins, 13 place, finished with a time of 18:13 while Phoenix Shadden, 15 place, finished in 18:17, only a few seconds behind.  The Atlantic varsity boys squad finished in seventh place.

The Trojan cross country teams will compete again on Thursday at the Atlantic Home Invitational Meet.