Certainly far scarier thoughts abound - particularly on Halloween - but waiting for the starter's gun with no teammates around for mental backup couldn't have been one of Bridget Goddard's most pleasant ponderings.
But the Bayfield junior made the best of the unique situation as her school's lone representative at last Saturday's 2015 CHSAA Class 3A state cross-country championships. She cracked the season-ending feature's top 100 by placing 92nd out of 147 at the Norris-Penrose Event Center in Colorado Springs.
Her time of 23 minutes, 3 seconds flat landed her behind Brush sophomore Ashley Hinojos (23:01.1) and before Colorado Springs Vanguard School senior Aubrey Milroy (23:06.0) at the finish line, amongst dozens trailing the leaders headed by Lafayette Peak to Peak freshman Quinn McConnell (18:41.1).
Salida's veteran trio of senior Sydney Fesenmeyer (19:55.6), junior Taryn Ceglowski (19:57.9) and senior Phoebe Powell (19:59.1) crossed 8-9-10, but when team points were tallied and non-scoring entrants like Goddard factored out, SHS' adjusted total of 50 trumped Peak to Peak's 56 and snagged the team title.
Englewood Kent Denver settled for third place with 115 points, Intermountain League power Alamosa (135) took fourth back to the San Luis Valley, and CA (147) ended up fifth. Also showing well for the IML, Pagosa Springs stood ninth in the standings with 270 points.
