Moses Lake cross country team holds its own in Hawaii

Maybe it’s the fact that the Moses Lake cross country team was racing on Kualoa Ranch, a 4000-acre private nature reserve on the windward coast of O’ahu, about 24 miles from Honolulu.

Or maybe, it’s because the location is a popular filming location for movies like “Jurassic Park,” “Mighty Joe Young,” and “Pearl Harbor.”

Or maybe it’s because the course at the 20th Annual 'Iolani Cross Country Invitational is one part jungle, one part gravel and all heart on the elevation changes that make cross country what it should be — a guts race and not some chalked line on a golf course.

It would have been easy to get caught up in the tourist side — visiting the waterfalls, swimming with sea turtles, or the spectacular cultural sights and sounds. The thing I think is most impressive is that Moses Lake came to race.

They knew going in they were racing in humidity, at sea level, a world away from the potato farms of Grant County. The course itself might be the greatest test of endurance they ever face. Some might go on to college, but for others, this is the toughest collection of runners from around the mainland and the islands they will ever compete against. Stride for stride, runners racing shoulder to shoulder, this is the best they’ve ever seen, and Moses Lake held its ground.

Chiefs junior Camille Carpenter had the race of her distance running career, finishing 37th in the 3.1-mile women’s varsity race in 20 minutes, 01.14 seconds. It’s just her second season of running cross country and she ran with the big kids through the jungles of O’ahu.

Just the fact that Mira Costa from Manhattan Beach, Calif., put three in the top 10 and seven runners in the top 25 tells you everything to know. Of course, there’s the fact that Nadia Tabrizi of J. Serra Catholic from San Juan Capistrano, Calif., won the women’s varsity race in 17:52.1, all but running Mira Costa’s top runner Brooke Inouye (18:17.6), who finished third, into the ground.

Ain’t it a beautiful game? Start the clock, stop the clock — what do ya got? Time filters everything else out.

Carlie Gregg (21:06.83) dipped inside the top 60 in a race that saw 22 runners cross in the 60 seconds she finished behind Carpenter. That’s how tough the field was. Mikayla Cooper (21:46.80) broke through into the top 75, finishing 73rd in her first race of the season.

The falloff for the Chiefs was at No. 4 and No. 5 in the lineup. The good news is that Melanie Flores finished 13th at the Apple Ridge Run back here at home in just her second-ever race. It’s a different track of course, but if Flores can push Cooper and either Avery Gephart and Chloe Hansen can make a significant surge forward, the Moses Lake girls have a shot at sending the team to the Class 4A state championships farther down the road.

In the men’s varsity race, Brandon Wood took a monster step forward in his racing career, finishing 55th in 17:20.33. The fact that J. Serra Catholic finished one-two and didn’t win tells you all you have to know about the boys race. Mira Costa proved pack time is everything with four in the top 11 to win.

But Moses Lake’s pack time was solid. Ketrin Hemmerling (59th), Nicholas Elliot (63rd) and Joshua Cooper (75th) put things in place for a run at the Columbia Basin Big Nine front-runners, Eisenhower.

The trip was billed as a dream race and the Moses Lake Chiefs came to play. They lived to race another day and they spent the day with a sea lion on the beach … while the rest of us back home in paradise valley endured another controlled burn.

Rodney Harwood is a sports writer for the Columbia Basin Herald and can be reached at rharwood@columbiabasinherald.com