The rain-swollen course turned into a mudbath, for competitors and spectators alike this past Saturday at the Centerville Stampede.  Times were expectedly slow, but the Spartans fought to stay competitive... and upright.  Nicholas El-Khoury and Antony Parnigoni delivered the 1-2 punch on the boy's side, with Jon Risher, Dave Rodriguez, and a shoe-less Joe Murray not far behind, good for a 3rd place team finish.  Spencer Lloyd, Paul Rodriguez, Jake Tracy, and Sean Kennedy placed in the top 25 for the Freshmen/Sophomore open race and Ian Bentley finished in the top 20 for the Junior/Senior open race.

Adrienne Grogan, Cassie Bacon, and Caroline Muth led the charge for Turpin in the girl's race for a 7th place team finish.  Not to be outdone by her brother, Rachel Bentley took 17th in the Junior/Senior open race with Katie Molloy and Emily Miller rounding out the top 3 Turpin finishers.  Michelle Mazzeo, Kaley Greenwood, and Caitlin Whitacre finished in the top 50 in the Freshmen/Sophomore open race.

This past weekend marked the end of the regular season, as the Spartans look ahead to the upcoming League and District Championships as well as what could lay beyond.  All three divisions of the Fort Ancient Valley Conference will converge upon William Henry Harrison High School on Saturday, October 17th to determine who will take home the league crown.

The District Championships will be hosted the following weekend on October 24th at Voice of America Park in West Chester.  Two races will be held to decide the top 8 teams (4 from each race) that will make the trip up to Troy for the Regional Championships on October 31st.

(Photo Credit -- A.Steible, Centerville)

On Saturday, September 26, the Turpin teams passed the halfway point of the season at the Harrison Invitational.  Running at Harrison in preparation for the FAVC league meet on October 17, the normally flat, fast course was turned into a muddy, mentally-challenging race due to three days of continuous rain.

Seniors Nicholas El-Khoury and Dave Rodriguez went 1-2 on the course, with sophomore Antony Parnigoni following in 4th place with a 17:14 finish.  Junior Joe Murray ran a 17:57, while Seniors Alex Polivka and the shoe-less Jon Risher followed in 18:27 and 18:30, respectively.  Sophomore Paul Rodriguez rounded out the squad with a 18:48.  The guys beat out 2nd place Loveland by 27 points for their 1st place win.

On the girls side, junior Adrienne Grogan again led the Turpin team with her time of 20:36.  Sophomore Rachel Lonneman continued to improve her standing on the team by running a 21:48 and being 2nd for the Spartans.  Senior Alexia Yun and sophomore Rachel Eckert ran times of 22:15 and 22:21 to help the Turpin girls.  Sophomore Michelle Robinson ran a 22:36 to finish the scoring for the Lady Spartans.  The girls team came in a close 6th behind Milford by only 2 points.

To not mention the Turpin JV at the Harrison meet would be unfair, as both the boys and girls JV preformed very well at the muddy course. Before the race, it was decided between the Varsity and JV guys teams that the team with the more points (the varsity team or the top 7 JV team) would have to buy the lower scoring team lunch.  Therefore, when junior Scott Wenderoth led the JV guys with a 2nd place 18:40 finish and was followed up by Jake Tracy (8th), Spencer Lloyd (9th), Sean Kennedy (10th), Ian Bentley (12th), Adam Galloway (15th), and Alex Slagle (24th), their combined score of 80 points beat out the Varsity team's total score of 139.  Needless to say, the Varsity team paid for lunch.

The Girls JV race re-introduced Senior Megan Plichta to the Turpin team.  Plichta, having been unable to run for the past 4 months due to injury, ran a 23:23 after only two weeks back.  Senior Lindsey Evans led the JV squad with her 9th place 22:26, and was followed by senior Brittany Newell, sophomore Katie Molloy and junior Maki Fujimoto with respective times of 22:40, 23:01, and 23:31.  

All the Turpin Spartans ran excellent races at the slow, muddy course.  The Spartans are traveling to St. X next week for the competitive St. Xavier Invitational.  Congratulations to all of Turpin's runners and good luck at St. X!

Race Results for Harrison can be found at http://oh.milesplit.us/meets/58073.