MileStat.com visited the Lee-Davis cross country team on their home course and venue for the Central Region Championships at Pole Green Park in Mechanicsville. Lee-Davis team ran a fairly challenging workout on a humid day with 4x1 mile repeat with 400 meter jog/walk recovery (roughly 4-5 minutes rest) with the first repeat at tempo pace, second fastest at even splits, third fastest at negative splits, and fourth finishing strong as the fastest. Lee-Davis coach Neil Mathews has a boys and girls team this fall which both have goals of winning the Capital District title and advancing onto the state meet as one of the four teams from the Central Region, but also has two returning All-State caliber individuals in Cody Snyder and Bonny Turnage.
Snyder was an All-State finisher in cross country last November, but has primarily been known as more of a middle distance runner with a sub 2:30 1000 and sub 4:20 mile to his credit. However, Snyder as a senior is starting to really apply his talent to the 5K distance as seen with his season opening runner-up finish at the Great Meadow Invite in late August. Snyder looked fit in the workout as he dropped down from 5:18, 5:12, 4:58, and 4:45.
Turnage was one of the state's top new distance running stars as a freshmen last year as she posted one of the faster 5K times ever at Pole Green in 18:14. She finished her freshmen year of cross country making it on the podium in an All-State top 15 finish in the Group AAA race. Turnage, who also ran 11:08 in the 3200 in the spring, will be one of the top contenders for the Central Region title with returning champion Erica Dobbs of Deep Run and Megan Moye of Cosby. She consistently ran in the 5:50s for all four of her mile repeats around the practice fields at Pole Green Park.