Varsity B Girls
Trinity's Barbara Strehler (pictured left by John Herzog) would have liked to competed against the top runners in the Varsity A division at Octoberfest including her top two competitors in the VIS in Anneka Wilson of The Potomac School and Megan Fitzpatrick of Bishop O'Connell, but had to settle with dominating another second tier field with her 18:34 victory in the Varsity B division. Since Trinity is a category 3 private school, the school cannot compete directly against Maryland public schools which were present in the varsity A division. The same situation arose at Maymont last week with Strehler having to race down in the coastal division, which she convincingly won albeit against some state ranked runners. Her time bests her previous all-time best of 18:40 from the 2007 Foot Locker South Regional.
Runner-up to Strehler was Warren County's Mara Smith in a time of 19:21. Smith had competed in Pennsylvania the past two weekends after winning the Eastern Mennonite Invite in mid September.
The Herndon girls opted to race in the Varsity B division without their top runner Hiruni Wijayaratne and were able to hold off a strong challenge by Group AA squad Briar Woods for the team title with 106 points. Sophomore Carolyn Hennessey led Herndon with a fifth place run of 19:57. Briar Woods had three runners among the top 11 places with Alexa Kniley (4th, 19:35), Giana Leone (6th, 20:04), and Amanda Presler (11th, 20:27).
Varsity B Boys
James Wood senior Darin Longerbeam, a likely Group AA All-State runner this fall, will certainly have a positive memory to recall next time that he races at Great Meadow after winning the Varsity B race at the Octoberfest Invite with a time of 16:15. Herndon's Jack Jasper was a runner-up to Longerbeam by four seconds at 16:19. Brian Davenport returned back to Great Meadow for the first time since helping the Thomas Jefferson boys to the Group AAA state championship last November, but with his team team at Maury High School in Norfolk. Davenport placed 3rd in the B race with a time of 16:25 and just ahead of Warren County's Adam Eakins at 16:25 as well.
Herndon made it a sweep on the "B" team titles as their boys also competed in the division while missing their top runner Todd Van Luling as their 83 points put them ahead of fellow Northern Region squad Thomas Edison with 97 points. Edison ran six of their top seven runners in the "B" race while #1 runner Leoule Degfae competed in the "A" race and ran an exceptional race to take runner-up behind Solomon Haile.