Runners staying busy

Despite having a week off in between winning the District 30-5A meet and the Region IV meet on Nov. 8, the Sharyland Rattlers boys' cross country team won't be taking it easy.

"We're going to be working pretty hard," Rattlers coach Joe Gonzalez said.  "We're going to be putting in some work around the same time we have to run at regionals. We're not going to take a break."

The Class 5A boys will be running around noon in the regional meet, which will be held at Brooks City Base on the south side of San Antonio.

There will only be a week between the regional meet and the state meet which is set for Nov. 15 at Old Settlers Park in Round Rock.

It will be interesting to see if there are any differences between the teams from the districts that ran meets two weeks before the regional meet and the teams from the districts that ran the week before the regional meet.

LOTS OF CHOICES

McAllen Memorial's Tricia Terry won the District 30-5A individual title and helped lead the Lady Mustangs to the team title last weekend, but she didn't have much time to spend celebrating as she got on a plane soon after the meet and headed to Florida for an official visit to the University of Miami.

Terry also recently visited the University of Arkansas.

She's also considering Baylor as well as Texas and Texas A&M among other schools.

STATE RANKINGS

There are two Valley teams ranked by the Cross Country Coaches Association of Texas in the latest poll (Oct. 22). In the Class 5A boys, PSJA North is ranked eighth. In the Class 3A boys, the Progreso boys are ranked ninth. Progreso has been in the state coaches' top 10 for most of the season.  Zapata, which competes in District 32-3A, has its boys ranked ninth and its girls ranked sixth.

Zapata captured both boys and girls district titles in the recent 32-3A meet.

Paul Conatzer covers cross country for Valley Freedom Newspapers. You can reach him at (956) 683-4442 or via e-mail at pconatzer@themonitor.com.