Chester High School Boys advance to IHSA State Cross Country Meet

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ The Chester High School Boys' Cross Country Team, coached by Scott Haxton, Head Coach, and Assistant Coaches, Bob Koenegstein, Paul Stallman and Mary Stallman, qualified to advance to the 2011 State Cross Country Meet in Peoria this Saturday November 5. The Yellow Jackets have not qualified as a team to compete at the State Meet as a team since 1979. The Yellow Jacket harriers will compete against the best runners in the State of Illinois this year.

Both the Chester Boys and Girls squads advanced to the 2011 IHSA Sectional Meet by running well at the Chester Regional Meet Saturday October 22. Both the Girls and Boys placed 3rd overall at Regionals to earn the right to compete at the 2011 Sectional Meet at SIU-E Edwardsville. The top-5 teams at Regionals advanced to Sectionals.

The Sectional Meet was Saturday October 29 on the Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville 3.1-mile course. The weather was almost perfect for running and the course was reportedly in great condition. To prepare for the race the Chester squads traveled to Edwardsville the night prior to the Sectional Meet, Friday October 28, to walk the course and learn the lay-of-the-land. Coach Scott Haxton and Koenegstein organized the pre-meet trip as a way to learn how to run the course and mentally prepare for battle the next morning.

The trip must have paid-off because the Boys' Team placed 5th overall out of 12 Class 1A Schools, which qualified them to advance to the State Meet this Saturday November 5. The Chester Girls' finished 9th out of 12 1A schools, which did not make the top-5 cut to advance to the State Meet.

Sparta won the Boys' event with a low total of only 36 points. Sparta's Jon Hill was the overall winner of the Sectional Meet with a time of 16:25. Teammates Wesley Bradshaw (2nd, 16:30) and Trevor Morgan (6th, 17:07) paired with Kenny Heaton (13th, 17:40) and Dylan Huether (14th, 17:41) to seal their first place finish.

Other top-5 Sectional finishers who qualified to advance to the State Meet included: Herrin (2nd, 128), Edwardsville-Metro-east Lutheran (3rd, 131), Freeburg (4th, 133) and Chester(5th, 159).

Rounding out the field of 12 Class 1A schools were Columbia (6th, 209), Pinckneyville (7th, 226), Belleville Althoff (8th, 267), Carmi-White County (9th, 267), Benton (10th, 273), Carterville (11th, 292) and Nashville (12th, 295).

Chester's lead runner was junior Devin Valleroy who ran the 3.1-mile race with a time of 17:17. Valleroy placed 7th overall. Link Cushman, who has been Chester's number two runner all season, ran a time of 17:45. The junior runner placed 15th overall. Verne White, one of Chester's only two seniors, ran an excellent race with a time of 18:24. He placed 28th overall.

Kyle Landon, another CHS junior, finished 45th overall with his 18:55 performance. Zach Sternberg, Chester's other senior runner, finished the race with a time of 19:26 which was good enough for 64th place. Chris Schwartz, another junior runner, had a time of 19:47. He finished 80th overall. Last but certainly not least, Brent Knop, a junior, ran a good race finishing 99th overall with a time of 20:26.

The Chester Boys Team has worked extremely hard this year to accomplish their team-goal of qualifying to advance to the 2011 IHSA State Cross Country Meet in Peoria this Saturday November 5. The Jackets will proudly represent themselves, the City of Chester and Chester High School as they run against the very best competitors in Illinois high schools.

The Chester High School Lady Jackets also competed at the 2011 IHSA Sectional Meet in Class 1A competition. The Lady Jackets, led by junior Taylor Yankey, finished 9th overall out of 12 schools. Yankey finished 28th overall with a time of 22:15. She bettered her Regional time of 22:16 by one second thusly finished her 2011 season with improvement.

Chester's number two runner, senior Emily Reid, also improved over her Regional. Reid ran 23:23 at Regionals and finished six seconds better at Sectionals with a time of 22:17. She placed 43rd overall. Improvement was the finishing touch on Reid's excellent high school running career. Maribeth Lawrence, only a junior, and a dual-sport athlete, was Chester's number three runner at Sectionals. Lawrence finished 61st overall and turned in a time of 24:21. Last week at Regionals Lawrence was Chester's 4th runner with a time of 25:05. She likewise finished her 2011 season with a nice 1:24 improvement.

Rounding out the Lady Jackets field of seven runners were sophomore Sarah Bindel, freshman McKenzi Rucker, freshman Madi Kueker and junior Courtney Johnson. Bindel had a time of 24:45 and she finished 70th overall. Rucker finished 73rd overall and had a 24:50 performance. At Regionals Rucker ran a time of 25:12, thusly she improved by 22 seconds at Sectionals. Kueker finished 98th overall and ran a time of 26:14. Rounding out the Lady Jackets attack was Johnson who finished 126th overall with a time of 29:18. Johnson improved 50 seconds over her Regional time of 30:08.

Freeburg won the Girl's Division of the 2011 IHSA Sectional Meet with a low score of only 44 points. Freeburg's Kristen Busch won the overall meet with a time of 18:59 while her sister, Caitlin Busch was the runner-up with a time of 19:47. Both girls are seniors. Freeburg's junior, Olivia VonBokel finished in 10th place (21:15) while senior Kirsten Thouvenot finished 13th (21:47). Freeburg will advance to the State Meet in Peoria Saturday November 5.

Other top-5 teams to advance to the State Meets include Roxana (2nd, 91), Carterville (3rd, 107), Edwardsville-Metro East Lutheran (4th, 146) and New Athens (5th, 155).

The other finishers in the 2011 IHSA Girl's Sectional Meet include: Red Bud (6th, 176), Piasa Southwestern (7th, 222), Waterloo Gibault (8th, 230), Chester (9th, 233), Belleville Althoff (10th, 288), Harrisburg (11th, 330) and West Frankfort (12th, 332).