Pictured (l-r) are Addy Hauke, Landen Eyre and Charli Hauke.
Submitted photo
Saturday at the University of Rio Grande, the Whiteoak cross country team competed in the southeast district division 3 races. The Lady Cats ran in the first race of the day and got things off to a great start. Sophomore Addy Hauke finished 13th out of 116 runners to earn a spot in the regional meet next week at Pickerington. Hauke ran a personal best time of 21:46 to earn her second consecutive regional qualifier and first-team all-district honor.
“Addy just keeps stepping up and learning more and more about how good she is and how great she can be,” Coach Doug Hughes said. “Addy’s 21:46 is the best time ever ran at the district meet by a Whiteoak girl runner. Last week at league she accomplished the same feat for best league time ever. Next week at Pickerington she can add to her list.”
Shadowing Addy the entire race was her twin sister Charli who finished with a 21:47 and 15th place finish joining her sister with all the postseason accolades and a trip to the regional meet in this, her first year of running.
“Charli was incredible today,” Hughes said. “Mapping the race she looked to be about 25th in this race, and I was sure to let her know that. The Hauke girls have a lot of “I’ll show you” and well, Charli did just that. It’s crazy that she was mainly volleyball all season and wasn’t able to run very much or hit a lot of practices. She ran her personal best time by more than a minute and Rio Grande isn’t a place to do that, but she showed me.”
In the boys race, Landen Eyre set southeast district history by becoming a four-time district champion runner. Eyre raced to a personal best 15:21.72 to out-distance the field of 152 runners.
“Landen was perfect today,” Hughes said. “To run at 15:21 at the district meet at Rio Grande, that’s not the quickest course and that’s the lowest time I’ve ever heard of there for any division in nearly 30 years. There were 13 district races today for division 3 runners all over Ohio, over 1400 runners and Landen had the best time out of all of them and next week he gets to face the kid that had the secondest time. It’s going to be fun.”
Eyre’s 10th first-place finish of the season brings his season record to 1704-1.
Whiteoak had six other runners tackle the Rio Course. Freshman, Aubrey Swafford was 81st (27:05) Keegan Eyre was 68th (19:24) Shane Mitchell-Cox with his personal best time this season of 19:36 finished 71st. Kenyon Hughes 113th (21:45), Shawn Mitchell-Cox 116th (21:53) and Austin Richards 136th (23:54)
“These kids all finished their seasons today and each one made me proud of their efforts,” Hughes said. “Some ran their final race, some their first district race but all can hold their head high.”
Eyre, Hauke and Hauke will run next Saturday at Pickerington North High School in the Division 3 Regional Meet.
