Bear Lake girls take 4th, boys 5th

Matt Wenzel, Manistee News Advocate Sports Editor

FILER TOWNSHIP — In the inaugural Manistee National Invitational, a lot of the hardware stayed close to home as the Bear Lake boys took first and the girls second.

A year later, and with a deeper and more talented field, nothing came easy for the host Lakers on Saturday. But, that’s how they wanted it.

“I hate easy trophies and easy medals,” said Bear Lake coach Eric Ross, a member of the race committee. “This year, they didn’t have either one of them. They didn’t have an easy trophy and they didn’t have an easy medal, they had to work to get where they were at.”

The Bear Lake girls took fourth and the boys fifth in the small-school division.

“This year they had to run against D3 schools and I like that,” Ross said. “I like that they have to work.”

Division 3 No. 6 Harbor Springs won the 10-team small-school division with 37 points, Charlevoix was second (38), Grand Traverse Academy third (65) and Bear Lake fourth (115).

Keena Gilbert paced the Lakers by taking 15th in 21:16, Jaylee Brown was a second behind (16th, 21:17), while McKaya Groenwald (28th, 22:25), Kelly Babcock (30th, 22:32) and Alycia Peterson (37th, 23:31) rounded out the score. Also running for Bear Lake was Meredith Hengy (41st, 23:49), Alyson Fink (54th, 24:59), Taylor Anderson (65th, 25:33) and Danielle Ward (69th, 26:00) in the race that allows for nine varsity runners.

Charlevoix won the 12-team boys race with 61 points, GTA was second (74), Harbor Springs third (88), East Jordan fourth (92) and Bear Lake fifth (132).

“It’s nice to have better competition,” said Tyler Groenwald. “Especially a week before regionals.”

Tyler Groenwald finished 12th overall (17:58), followed by Alex Barto (27th, 18:44), Kyle Nettler (29th, 18:46), Jared Bair (32nd, 18:50) and John Girven (34th, 18:54). Alex Ringel (55th, 19:58), Parker Sternberger (63rd, 20:22), Stephen Verrett (64th, 20:26) and Shane Peterson (71st, 21:08) didn’t factor in the Bear Lake score.

“Today, this course was a little slow, a little wet, but with the conditions I think we all ran pretty good,” Tyler Groenwald said.

The course, which was run on Cutter’s Ridge at Manistee National Golf & Resort, was a bit wet in areas but Saturday’s weather was pristine with temperatures in the high-50s to go with clear skies.

The number of teams in the meet more than doubled in its second year and Ross was pleased with how it went.

“There were more than few suggestions, but there were no complaints,” he said. “I love suggestions, give them to me all day long because that’s my job to make this better and we did. We made it better than last year and next year we’ll make it better than this year. Whatever these guys want is what we want to give them.”

High resolution photos of this event, and other local events, taken by the News Advocate staff, can be purchased at the News Advocate's site http://www.manisteenews.com/

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