Kimball Cross Country Opens At Scottsbluff

The Kimball Longhorn Cross Country Team opened the season at the Scottsbluff Panhandle Classic Invite this past Thursday evening and the highlight for coach Tiffany Johnson’s runners was a top 25 medal performance by sophomore Chantel Malson, who finished 22nd in the field of 107 runners in the female division.

Malson, a sophomore, ran the 5,000 meter course at the Riverside Golf Course in 23 minutes 46.29 seconds. The winning time by Regan Hodsen of Mitchell was 20:33.53.

The Kimball girls had only 3 runners in the girls division and were short of the required number for team scoring. Raven Johnson ran 74th in 28:44.99 and Brandi Councilman was 92nd in 31:39.

Kimball had 5 runners in the High School boys division and finished 9th in team standings with 176 points. Sidney won the team title with 17 followed by Gering with 33 and Mitchell with 44 for the top three.

Trevor Kund of Mullen was the individual winner with a time of 17:48.61. Matthew Johnson was Kimball’s top finisher clocking 21:19.61 over the 5,000 meter course to finish 52nd in the field of 131 runners. Connor Cluff ran 72nd in 22:22.8, Cole Henton 78th in 23:03.75, Xavier Thomas-Lewis 104th in 25:15.02, and Lane Wasielewski 121st in 28:43.66.

Coach Johnson also had 12 junior high runners including 9 boys and 3 girls. The Kimball boys finished 5th in the team standings with 99 points while the girls lacked numbers to score as a team in the 3,000 meter race.

There were 84 boy participants with Kimball’s top runner, Cody Brinkman finishing 20th in 13:14.97, Joseph Bremer 29th in 13:44.25, Braylon Miller 30th in 13:45.94, Trenton Hottell 54th in 15:02.05, Aaron Gillming 65th in 16:17.94, Brandon Paxton 67th in 16:53.55, Draco Miller 76th in 18:07, Patrick Howard 80th in 19:42, and Landon Norberg 81st in 20:08.

The boys junior high winner was Hans Bastron of Scottsbluff with a winning time of 10:57.94. There were 74 junior high girls with Grace Pyle of Chadron running the winning time of 12:21.03. Shannon Marks ran Kimball’s best time of 18:39 to finish 56th, Kylie Osborn ran72nd in 23:59, and Ashlie Barker was 73rd in 25:07.

Next action for the Kimball runners is Friday, September 6th, at Gering with a start time of 11 a.m.