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Full tank of Gass
Raiders boys, girls sweep SMAC meet
Friday, Oct. 30, 2009
Gass passed those signs and crossed the finish line in first place with a time of 20 minutes 12 seconds to secure the individual SMAC title, and she indeed helped her team earn a No. 1 spot, and its sixth consecutive SMAC championship, in the process.
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photo by REID SILVERMAN
Chopticon's Tyler Ostrowski placed second overall in the boys race Wednesday with a time of 16 minutes 46 seconds.
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"I was shocked," Gass said of the support. "I had more people show up this time to watch me than I have ever had before. It was nice to have them. It was a surprise, and it probably pushed me harder on that last straight away.
"I wanted our team to do very well, too. I wanted us to win for the sixth time in a row, and that what our main goal was as a team."
The Leonardtown girls packed the top 10 places with runners as they placed six runners in the top 10, all six of which finished in the top seven, much to the joy of Leonardtown head coach Jamie Copsey.
"Our goal today was to get five in the top eight, and they exceeded that," Copsey said of his girls' performance. "We have been working on getting our fifth runner closer to our fourth, third and second runners, and they definitely did that today."
Anna Frowein (20:47) took third place and teammates Kate Finkelston (21:18) and Cali Copsey (21:20) rounded out the top five, respectively. The Raiders girls finished with a team score of 19, besting second-place North Point's 75 points and third-place Northern's 104 team points.
Anna Sparr (23:36) and Samantha Sparr (23:51) placed in 21st and 25th place, respectively, tops for Great Mills aiding it, and head coach Arturo Leon to a seventh-place finish.
Mary Reed (24:46) finished tops for Chopticon by placing 36th overall, respectively, and helped her team to a ninth-place finish.
Odd job for Raiders boys
Although Leonardtown's Tyler Blake finished third individually on the boys side with a time of 17:15, the Raiders boys also won a SMAC title with a team score of 35.
Northern took second with a 72 and Patuxent finished third with 109 points.
The Raiders used the power of the odd number to take home its sixth consecutive conference title as Copsey witnessed Blake finish third, Ryan Ponse take fifth, Sean Hageman earn seventh, Brian Oechsel in ninth, Mark Sweet in 11th, and Tim Carey in 13th place, respectively.
"The boys got the job done," Copsey said. "I thought we got a pretty good start there, but some of the guys there fell back a little bit towards the second mile. But, they still packed it up, certainly enough to get the win."
Northern's Ryan O'Connor placed first overall with a time of 16:29 and Chopticon's Tyler Ostrowski (16:46) finished second overall in helping Chopticon to a sixth-place team finish.
"It feels pretty good, but I definitely wanted that first place," Ostrowski said. "…Knowing I have a lot of the same competition in regionals, I have to work that much harder to catch [O'Connor]. I need to work on my middle distance to the last mile."
Great Mills finished fourth overall on the day as a team with 132 points, led by a sixth-place finish by sophomore Conor Smith (17:29) and an eighth-place finish by junior Peter Offenbacher (17:54).
Leon was more than pleased with his team's fourth-place finish, and looks for the day's efforts to help confidence going into the Class 4A East regional meet, set for Nov. 5 at Baybrook Park.
"We are very proud of them because this is a big improvement from last year," Leon said. "We are in a place where we are looking forward to building to the next year. … We knew Conor would be up there, but to come ahead of some other runners, we are very proud of him.
"We are very happy to be in the position that we are in now."
