Photo by Jake Przytarski Dawson-Boyd/Lac qui Parle Valley’s Mason Brehmer competes in the Class A meet on Saturday. Brehmer took 61st while DB/LQPV placed fourth as a team.

NORTHFIELD – The Dawson-Boyd/Lac qui Parle Valley boys cross country team joined the girls team at the state meet on Saturday at St. Olaf and put together a tremendous performance against the best single A teams in the state of Minnesota, placing fourth overall among the 16 qualifying teams and boasted four runners placing inside the Top 50 individually.

Among the Top 50 finishers was junior Mike Kvaal with a 16:33 time that was good enough for 14th place. Sophomore Zeke Sather finished just behind Kvaal with a final time of 16:54 and placing 24th and junior Griffin Johnson alongside Eean Allpress finished 26th and 45th. Just outside the Top 50 was freshman Mason Brehmer who placed 61st with a final time of 17:34.

Though Brehmer didn’t run as well as he had hoped due to an illness that he was forced to battle through, he was excited to see his teammates break some of their PRs.

“The team ran really well, everyone worked really well we had quite a few PRs,” said Rehmer. “Individually I did not have the race that I wanted to, I ran about 13 seconds off my PR. (I) just didn’t feel good and it kind of didn’t help me throughout the race.”

Rounding out the rest of DB/LQPV were Payton Sterud and Colby Deuth who placed 71st and 73rd with times of 17:50 and 17:53, respectively.

Racing individually but representing their teams after qualifying during sections, Minneota/Canby senior Jared Josephson finished 122nd with a final time of 17:45. Joining Josephson in representing the local schools were Yellow Medicine East’s Rory Shackelford and Murray County Central/Fulda’s Justin Clarke who finished 92nd and 59th, respectively.

With a final time of 17:04, Clarke was very happy with the way he ran on Saturday and even set a new personal best time.

“I thought it was very good,” said Clarke. “I think running 17:03 (17:04), which would be my best performance here so that’s really good.”

Class A girls

Standing alone as the only local single A team competing in the state meet on Saturday in St. Olaf, the DB/LQPV cross country team was unsure if they would even make it this far after losing their top runner a season ago. Exceeding their own expectations, the team finished eighth overall and senior Isabel Schirm could not be prouder of her teammates.

“I am so proud of my team,” said Schirm. “Honestly we didn’t know at the beginning of the season if we were going to be here or not this year. We lost our number one runner last year, she goes to Northern State, and we just didn’t know how it was going to go this year, but I am so proud of them. We got second to Luverne at sections, (a) great team and these girls have done such a good job this year and I’m so proud of them.”

Helping to contribute to the eighth-place finish was their team leader in Schirm who paced her team with a ninth-place finish and a time of 19:22. Senior Grace Hegland placed 33rd with a time of 20:13 and eighth grader Anika Fernholz placed 37th with a time of 20:21. Finishing just outside the Top 50 was eighth grader Taylor Shelstad finishing 63rd and sophomore Alex Stitt. Junior Georgia Will and sophomore Josie Shurb finished 103rd and 107th overall, respectively.

Representing their schools as individual participants in the Class A meet were Minneota/Canby’s Grace Dietz and McKenzie Ruether, along with Murray County Central/Fulda’s Morgan Gehl who all turned in strong performances in the race.

M/C sophomore Ruether finished 135th with a time of 21:29 while freshman Dietz and MCC/F sophomore Gehl each placed within the Top 10 of all racers with times of 18:30 and 17:53, respectively, good enough for sixth and third place overall. Cotter siblings Grace and Lauren Ping took the first two spots with times of 17:19.4 and 17:41.5, respectively.

After the race, when asked about what it took to get to this point, Gehl pointed to the tremendous amount of hard work with the help of some of the boys team members pushing her along the way.

“(It took) a lot of hard work,” said Gehl. “The boys on my team would always push me really hard so I’m really thankful for them.”

With all of the individual racers set to return next year and many of the DB/LQPV team members set to make their return as well, the future of cross country in Southwest Minnesota is looking stronger than ever.