Foot Locker South Kentucky Preview
There are three big reasons to make the long journey to Charlotte for Foot Locker South every year. #1 is the possibility of qualifying for Foot Locker Nationals in San Diego, California. #2 is to gain experience to better you for trying to qualify for nationals next year. #3 the course is super fast and you can run a big time PR. Kentucky has 102 runners competing on Saturday all the way from the Open Race for the former high school runners to the Championship Races to the Youth runs at the end.
Boys Action
The boys Seeded Race provides Kentucky with its best chance of having a male qualifier since Michael Eaton won the South Regional in 2005. Class A State Champion Jacob Thomson has been making headlines all season long with big time performances this fall. He was third overall at the Great American Cross Country Festival in North Carolina in early October. He ran a best time of 15:02 in the process, finishing five seconds behind winner Daniel Moore of Florida. Moore has chosen to run in the Nike Cross Nationals Regional. The second place finisher that day was Jacob Burcham of West Virginia running a 15 flat. Burcham was rated #7 in the last MileSplit US Individual Rankings which is the highest in the southeast. Two national qualifiers from last yearreturn Thomas Graham (NC) and Ahmed Bile (VA), a third Elliott Clemente (FL) is running at Nike. Each of them won their respective state championships.
If Thomson runs like he has been all season he should be a solid pick for a top ten spot on Saturday. If he is at the top of his game, he could win breaking the 15 minute barrier in the process. Thomson has experience winning on this course; he was the Freshman Race winner in 2009. He ran a 16:11 to beat Thomas Madden (VA) by three seconds. Madden was a state championship this fall in Virginia as well.
Oldham County’s Luke Weishaar, Bell County’s James Brown, Lexington Catholic’s Nicholas Laureano, Sayre’s Nicholas Waltman, and Butler’s Patrick Gregory lead the charge behind Thomson. The seniors Weishaar and Brown will be looking to finish their XC careers with a top 20 finish, while Waltman, Laureano, and Gregory will be adding valuable experience of handling the opening mile and fighting the crowd for next year.
Girls Action
Two of the three state championships are running on Saturday. AAA champ Cassidy Hale of duPont Manual and A champ Maddox Patterson of Sayre each come in hoping to crack the 18 minute barrier for the first time ever. Hale has a advantage over Patterson as she has ran at Foot Locker before, where as the freshman Patterson is making her first trip. Cassidy finished 56th last year with an 18:37. Both of them going under 18:00 would get them into the top 20 most likely which would be a great starting point for next year. How each of them handle the opening mile will be key as it will go out faster than any race either of them have run this year.
Daviess County’s Whitney O’Bryan, John Hardin’s Katie Lever, and Manual Kristen Hale will also be close behind the two for Kentucky. K. Hale ran a 17:55 last year at the Fast Cats Classic giving her the fastest PR of the bunch. O’Bryan has had more training time to heal from the injury that knocked her out of regionals. Lever will look to end her HS XC career with a sub 18:15 performance.