West Holmes does its best to stand out in a mammoth field at Tiffin XC

A crowded New York City street has nothing on the Tiffin Cross Country Carnival that took place Saturday, Sept. 12 in Tiffin.What is widely thought of as one of the premier cross country meets in Ohio, Tiffin showcases the talents of thousands of runners, and it can be easy to get lost in the mass of humanity that lines up to run. However, West Holmes athletes did some pretty good things in keeping their names in the highlights.Once again, Lady Knights’ junior Michelle Hostettler found herself running behind Lexington’s Dominique Clairmonte. Just like last weekend at Ashland, Hostettler earned a silver medal for her second place finish in a time of 18:42.35. However, this time she carved the distance between herself and Clairmonte to 45 seconds, 40 seconds less than at Ashland.“With 1,000 meters to go she was only 14 second behind,” said coach Kevin Beachy of Hostettler. “Then Dom put the hammer down, but we will definitely take that.”That led West Holmes to an 18th place finish in the 29-field invite, not a bad outcome considering the team was missing two key components in Hannah Clark and Hannah Schlegel, who were battling the ACT test instead.“For us to finish 19th in the A-race, without two of our top runners is really great,” said Beachy. “Alexis, Megan and Kaylor all ran really good races. Alexis and Megan were very close to PRs, and Kaylor ran sick, so it was a good all-around team effort.”Amber Murphy ran her typical solid race, finishing 49th in the 193-runner field. She finished in a time of 21:20, about 10 seconds off of her PR.Freshman standout Erin Norman continued to make a fine early impression, placing 91st in a time of 22:26.Other runners for West Holmes included Alexis Hunter (140th/24:09.2), Megan Morrison (141st/24:09.8) and Kaylor Perone (143rd/24:18). With five runners in the top 12, Lexington ran away with the competition.On the guys’ side of the ledger, it was once again Vinny DeFelice who ran strong to pace the Knights, who placed 21st in a field of 25 teams that featured a whopping 316 runners. West Holmes did not know it until the race was about to begin, but the Knights were paired right beside Sheridan High School, the team many believe could win the Division II state title this year. That changed the mind-set for DeFelice.“We told Vinny there was a change of plans,” said Beachy. “We told him to run with Sheridan’s top runner Joey Polumbo, and Vinny hung right with him the whole race.” Polumbo would end up 11th, with DeFelice nipping at his heels.In a meet that saw Loudon Valley put their runners into the top four spots and seven in the top 14 finishers, the competition was fierce, but the Knights did have some solid performances.As the boys continue to work through their line-up, this meet showed again that the spots behind DeFelice are up for grabs.“We’re coming around, starting to find ourselves,” said Beachy of the guys. “We are starting to pack well, which is a good thing in cross country. We just need to continue to move that pack forward in the standings. We have seen some strides in practice, and I think that is going to carry over into the meets as we move forward.”Teddy Oliver continued to show marked improvement, placing second on the Knights’ team, placing 183rd in a time of 19:03. Coming in third for the Knights was Josh Weigand, who was right on Oliver’s heels at 19:06, good for 185th. Mark Raber ran fourth for West Holmes in a time of 19:12, good for 197th place.Jonathon Kandel saved a huge kick at the end to pass a number of runners to finish with a time of 19:46, which placed him 236th overall. Other Knights places and times included Matt Chanay (248th/20:01) and Randall Wilkinson (261st/20:34).In the boys’ Division II open, Danny Drummond placed 114th overall in a time of 20:55. Zedrick Clark ran a great race, placing next in line for the Knights and 136th overall in a time of 21:20. Tyler Miller (186th/22:10), Terrell Yoder (205th/22:28), Zach Bowles (210th/22:38), Brandon Zemrock (250th/24:00), Cole Guerra (252nd/24:02) and Nate Westbrook (288th/25:43) rounded out the Knights’ team effort.