by Al Linsky
Kaa'awa - This is one beautiful course!
Remnants from Jurassic park, dinosaur tracks, cows (and cowpies), all sorts of wildlife, mountains, and streams (dry as a bone) met the Iolani cross country team on Saturday.
The course was held on a part of Kualoa Ranch that is not usually open to the public, about one mile farther north than the layout used by the Iolani Invitational in past years. The weather was superb. Yes, pretty warm, and not much of a breeze on the upper part of the course, but rain would have turned the course into a dangerous, slippery mass of mud. So we were fortunate. There were some very steep hills, uphill and downhill, that would have been very difficult to negotiate if it had been slippery.
Again, this meet was unscored. This will change next week at CORP when USATF officials take over the meets and everyone gets official times.
I usually cover the finish line, but today I wanted to look for better photographic locations, so I didn't even see the finishes. The girls team was told to just have fun. The courses were not regulation distance as the intermediate and open races were 1.6 miles and the varsity was 2.5 miles. So, times were not that useful. The Lady Raiders still won the intermediate race (Breanne 1st) and the open race (Kim 1st, Jenna 2nd, Phoebe, Miranda and Val in the top 10).
Some teams decided to skip this meet because they felt the course was too difficult and didn't want to chance it. Too bad. This course was not that difficult and, in my opinion, it was one of the best and most beautiful courses we've had. I sure hope this becomes an annual affair.
