By Alexander Simone

Staff writer

Even without a full team, Marion cross-country is establishing itself as a force for the future.

Each of the four Warriors ran a personal best at Thursday’s invitational in Hesston.

“A lot of it’s the course, a lot of it’s the weather conditions and stuff like that,” coach Grant Thierolf said. “Today is really a nice day to run. Our kids got better from where we were last week.”

In her second high school race, freshman Heidi Grimmett took first place in the freshman race for schools 1 through 3A.

The Hesston race was different from Marion’s other races because there was a separate boys and girls race for each grade-level.

“I like the 4A, 5A, 6A format with all the kids running together,” Thierolf said. “When they find out they can run with the Wichita kids, the Dodge City kids, and the Garden City kids, that’s encouraging for them.”

Heidi ran a 21:15.8, which is 2 minutes, 2.9 seconds faster than her previous race.

“I think that was fun,” Thierolf said. “In Heidi’s case, she ran against somebody who she had run with a couple of years ago in track club. It’s fun to see those kids you know.”

In his second race ever, Braxton Schuh set a new best, finishing in 23:18.9. Dropping two minutes off his time won’t win a race, but it brings Braxton securely into the middle of the pack. Including the preseason, he has dropped four minutes from his time.

Sophomore Colton Boudreaux came closer to breaking the 20-minute wall, finishing with a 20:19.2. The time netted him a top-30 finish, missing a top-20 medal by seven spots.

Bethany Grimmett showed the most improvement overall. She cut more than six minutes from her previous race-time, finishing Thursday in 29:05.5.

Knocking six minutes off a 5K is an achievement nearly unheard of in cross-country, and she topped it off by placing 31st in the juniors’ race.