Go Dolphins!

On Saturday, September 14th, they went to the Pam Pack Invitational Cross Country 5K at Washington NC. Seventeen schools competed with 13 schools fielding a boys team and 12 schools fielding a girls team. Medals were given to the top ten runners and Kevin Perez and Karen Perez both won medals.

162 boys ran in the men's event. The schools were a mix of 1A, 2A, 3A, and 4A schools, both public and private. Out of the 162 boys, Kevin Perez placed 8th with a personal best time of 18:30. Also placing in the top 20 were Adam Carter in 16th with a time of 18:59, Carlos DeLao in 18th ran 19:06. Jordi Perez, Evin Caswell and Andrew Tillett rounded out the team with Evin running a personal best time and Andrew knocking over a minute off of his best time this year. 

The boy's team came in 5th overall ahead of all of the other 1A teams and also ahead of 3A Havelock and 4A JH Rose.   In the girl's race, there were 121 runners competing. Karen Perez was 3rd overall with a personal best time of 21:30. Abigail Morris was also in the top 25 with a time of 23:47. Alin Tellez was 30th with a time of 24:32. Kaylee Gaskins ran 27:41, over a minute ahead of her last race time.. The Dolphins did not have enough girls to field a team for the team competition, but everyone ran really well.  

The cross country squad also returned to Manteo on Tuesday for another all conference meet. The Boys came away with a win again and the girls all ran very well, but did not have enough runners to field a team. In the boys' race, Kevin Perez won with another personal best time of 18:26.  

The Dolphin Cross Country runners had another great weekend at the Bo Run Invitational in Greenville, NC on September 21st.

In a field of 104 runners representing 14 different schools: Kevin Perez placed 2nd, Adam Carter was 8th, Carlos DeLao was 10th, Jordi Perez was 24th, Evin Caswell was 51st and Andrew Tillett was 74th. The boys varsity team also won the 2nd place trophy.

In a field of 71 runners representing 16 different schools: Karen Perez placed 3rd, Abigail Morris was 8th, Alin Tellez was 13th, Sydney Austin was 29th and Kaylee Gaskins was 33rd bringing all of the girls team into the top half of the field. The girls varsity team won the 2nd place trophy.

In the middle school JV race in a field of 55 runners Jeyson Resendiz was 5th, Darvin Contreras was 10th and Liam Caswell was 19th bringing all of our runners into the top 20.

The teams scored 9 medals and 2 trophies. Many of the runners achieved their personal best times and the rest were very close to their best times. Their coaches, Kitty Mitchell and Adam Burleson, are very proud of these hard working runners.

In other running news.... the day after the Bo Run, Dolphins cross country coach Kitty Mitchell, her mother Sally Martin, and her daughter Katy Mitchell did the Sprint Triathlon in Manteo, NC with Brooke Doane and Emily Lyons. (All but Sally are Ocracoke residents.) Each competitor swam 750 yards, biked 13.5 miles and ran for 5K.   Kitty Mitchell won her age group, 60-64 (old ladies) and Sally Martin won her age group, 75 and older (she is 83, really old ladies). It was a torrential downpour for most of the race, but the water was warm and it wasn't too windy, which made for decent racing weather in spite of the rain. All of the women are glad to be dry!   

The Ocracoke Current would especially like to thank Coach Kitty for providing us with photos and stories about the Dolphin runners. We hope the other coaches will follow Kitty's lead!