Cross country prepares for only home meet

CHENEY — A handful of Priest River Lamanna High School cross country runners competed in the Battle for the 509 at Fairways Golf Course on Saturday.

“We had a great day of cross country racing on Saturday with multiple personal bests from our athletes,” Priest River cross-country head coach Lance wrote in an email.

Junior Graden Hanes was the only runner from Priest River that competed in the boys junior varsity 5K. Hanes finished in 86th out of 303 runners with a time of 19:38.8.

Four Spartans also took part in the boys 5K freshman combined. Dylan Lord led they way in the event, placing 39th with a 20:43.1. Ethan Korff came in 74th and Edgil Williams crossed the finish line just over a second later to take 75th.

Keith Magers rounded out the Priest River runners in the race. He took 115th with a time of 25:57.4.

On the girls side, sophomore Erika Swoboda was the sole Spartan in the girls junior varsity 5k. She finished 42nd with a time of 24:21.6.

In the girls 5K freshman combined, Lilly Freitas claimed 32nd with a 26:56.02 and Jaylein Zylstra secured 42nd at 28:42.83.

Olivia Tefft and Nikita Angel claimed 48th and 50th respectively to cap off the runners at the event.

The team is now gearing up to host the Ivan Benson Invite on Thursday. This is Priest River’s only home meet of the season and the varsity and junior varsity girls will kick things off at 4 p.m. followed by the boys at 4:40 p.m.