The Potomac River Running Holiday Invitational, hosted on its rescheduled snow date of December 26th, had two state leading performances produced by Stafford freshmen Hannah Lowery in the girls distance races and South Lakes senior senior Adrian Vaughn in the boys' sprints.
Lowery, one of the top newcomers this fall in the cross country season, has continued to excel on the track as she won both the 1600 and 3200 meter races in automatic state qualifying performances including a narrow 5:11 win over Lake Braddock junior Casey Lardner in the 1600 meter run. Lowery came back later to win the 3200 meter run with a little bit more breathing room in 11:16 with James Robinson's Taylor Crosson completing a solid double in second place at 11:27 after finishing third in the 1600 earlier (5:17).
Vaughn is trying to follow in the footsteps of big brother Nick, who had a great high school career at South Lakes. Vaughn came up just short in taking two first place finishes in the difficult 500/300 double as he tightened up in the final stretch against DeMatha Catholic's Michael Williams (1:08.83) with a runner-up performance of 1:08.98, but bounced back nicely to post the state's fastest time for 300 meters in his 35.34 first place clocking.
In one of the first major meets in the post Coach Don Beeby era for the West Potomac distance runners, their school swept the 1000 meter races with Peter Stebbins (2:36.27) taking the boys race and Dale Lescher (3:09.33) crossing the line in first for the girls.
The South County girls appear to have some of the best speed found in the Northern Region as they rolled to victories in both the 4x200 (1:49.27) and 4x400 (4:09.91) meter relays.
Stafford had other individuals besides freshmen runner Lowery who garnered first place finishes in Landover on Saturday including a 1-2 showing in the 55 meter hurdles by Kierra Butler (9.04) and Kiah Zaremba (9.17). Ashley Cooper also claimed the shot put title for Stafford with her best throw of 31'7" and Matt Hazelgreen's 6 foot clearance was enough to win the boys high jump.
Pole vault state leader Matt Hoogland competed in the holiday meet and won the competition easily despite only clearing 13 feet after raising his standards much higher with his 15'1" personal best clearance earlier this month, while Centreville's Katie Bannon might have set herself as one of the Northern Region girls' favorites in the event with her 9'3" win.
Alex Clark of Lake Braddock pulled away to win the 3200 meter run by a 11 second margin of victory against West Springfield's Colin Taylor with a final time of 9:49.
Centreville's Paul Barbour posted a solid mark of 43'4" to take first place in the boys' triple jump.
Race Videos - All running events except for 3200 and 4x400 (Note: Had to depart meet early for family weeding)
Photo Gallery - To be added soon.
Below are the performances entered for the meet that met the national silver standard.
50
National Elites.