Landen Eyre on his way to SHAC history
Submitted photo
On Saturday at Ripley High School, the Whiteoak Wildcats cross-country runners competed at the Southern Hills Athletic Conference Championships. The first race of the day was the varsity boys and Landen Eyre displayed his dominance with his fourth straight league championship by cruising to a one-minute and 26 second victory. Eyre ran a 15:47 to defeat the field of 63 competitors.
“Another tremendous achievement that he makes seem mundane,” Coach Doug Hughes said. “He’s the second male SHAC runner to ever win all 4 years, but the last 3 years, no one has been within a minute of him, that doesn’t even sound possible. The course was about eight seconds longer this year than the prior 17 years, so his 15:47 this year is better than his 15:47 he ran last year. Landen is primed and ready for the postseason. These next 3 weeks should be fun.”
With his 9th meet win of the season, Eyre moves to 1553-1 on the season.
As that varsity boys race continued, Landen got to witness his younger brother Keegan fly across the finish line in ninth place with a time of 18:30, thus earning him all-league alongside his brother.
“Keegan is in his first year of running cross country and he was stuck just above 20 minutes most of the season but he trusted me, stayed patient, but most importantly worked hard at practice and today he attacked a course like he didn’t know he could…now he knows and he can compete next week at districts,” Hughes said.
Whiteoak rolled in four more runners to round out the scoring as Shane Mitchell-Cox clocked a 20:02, his personal best of the season and a 26th-place finish. Kenyon Hughes was 41st (21:31), Shawn Mitchell-Cox 50th (22:58) and Austin Richards 59th (26:34)
“These four boys all play soccer and it’s a lot to do both,” Hughes said. “They gave great efforts today. Richards, a senior, broke his ankle just before soccer season started and he’s just now been able to jog at all. He’s seven minutes behind where he would’ve been but he’s a competitor and he really wanted to be out there to finish out his senior season.”
On the girls’ side, the Lady Cat runners represented well. Addy Hauke took sixth place with a time of 21:51.
“She doesn’t know this but she just ran the best time at the league meet of any girls in Whiteoak history,” Hughes said. “Ashleigh Harless ran a 21:52 in 2015. Addy pushed herself and is preparing herself for a challenging district race next week.”
This is Addy’s second all-league honor for cross country. And much like the boys, Addy got to witness her sister Charlie Hauke earn an all-league honor in her first year of running with a 13th place finish and a time of 23:17. Freshman Aubrey Swafford ran her first-ever varsity league meet race and finished in 30th place with a time of 27:05.
The junior high kids represented well as Adrian Ehkator raced to an 11th place finish and a time of 12:07. Ehkator, just a 7th grader ran the 2nd best time for a Whiteoak 7th grader in Coach Hughes’s 21 years. Teammates Jason Wolf 36th place (14:43) and Luke Cox 41st (15:59) both easily secured their top times of the season. Kenley Juillerat finished in the top 10 for her second straight year with 10th place and a time of 14;47 while teammate Natalie Burnett was 11th with a 14:51. Rounding out the running was Tessa Frazier who finished 29th with a time of 17:20. This was Frazier’s top time of the year by over two minutes.
