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Lady Cubs take home meet with 6 in the top 10

The Olney High School cross country team won its home meet in dominating fashion after placing six runners in the top 10 of last Saturday’s competition.

The Marquez sisters led the pack of Lady Cubs’ runners with Anahi taking second (14:28) and Marisol taking fourth (14:46), followed by Leslie Acuna, who finished (seventh, 15:25), Abby Harrison (eighth, 15:26), Kodee Scott (ninth,15:53) and Kiera Owen (10th 16:12).

Henrietta sophomore Abby Zamzow, a 2015 regional qualifier, took the race by an astounding 45-second margin.

“She was good. She had really long strides and kept it up the whole two miles. She was good,” Anahi Marquez said. “We did really well today. Even though we couldn’t keep up with that first girl, we improved a lot on our times today.”

Saturday’s race seemed an indicator of things to come for the Lady Cubs, who faced off against schools they will likely see in the district and regional competitions.

“We’ve been working really hard this year, since the summer,” Marisol Marquez said. “We’re going to go to regionals this year and win district.”

The Lady Cubs will take next week off then travel to Wichita Falls for a competition at Lucy Park. Until then, Olney coach Dickie Scott said he will continue introducing new forms of conditioning, focusing on differing muscle groups, in order to continue improving his runners’ times.

“We did pretty good (Saturday), but the improvement leveled off,” Scott said. “That’s better than going backwards. In running, you hit mesas and you have to shock their system by doing something different to hit the next mesa. We hit a plateau so we will change up their training. The more you improve, the harder it is to improve more ... We’re going to focus on the second mile, the second half.””

Scott described the Lucy Park competition as a highly competitive meet with a flat course that caters to speed runners.

“It’s a good course,” Scott said. “The kids like it because it’s pretty flat”

Although pleased with the Marquez sisters improvement, Scott said he is also pleased with Acuna’s recent performance and sees her making great strides before the season ends.

“She has had substantial improvement,” Scott said. “She is my fourth runner, who is getting right up there with my third runner. We’ll just keep piling them up there.”