Orozco, Harbor get job done

LAGUNA HILLS — Fernando Orozco stood by the medal table, slapping hands with finishers Saturday at the 25th annual Laguna Hills Invitational cross country meet.

As he did so, the Estancia High senior caught his breath. Orozco had earned the break, since nobody could keep up with him in the Division III senior boys’ race on the three-mile course at Laguna Hills High.

Orozco finished in first in a personal-record time of 15 minutes, 29 seconds, over five seconds ahead of the second-place runner, highlighting Newport-Mesa finishers in the meet that divides races by class and division. It was a great start to the season for the Eagles’ No. 1 runner. He had finished second in the Division III sophomore race two years ago, then fourth in the junior race last year at the season-opening meet.

“I’ve been waiting for that,” Orozco said of Saturday’s first-place run. “It was very physical. At the beginning of the race, everybody was pushing and bumping into each other. I got through [the start], and thankfully, I started picking people off. I tried to stay with the first group, and thank God I did good.”

The Eagles placed fifth as a team in the Division III senior boys’ division, not totally surprising to Coach Charlie Appell since he said he has eight seniors. Willy Rodriguez was next, finishing 16th in 16:18.

“It was good,” Rodriguez said. “It was kind of fast, but my coach said to go out with a positive attitude and I got a [personal record]. [Orozco] took off at about two miles. I just need to work harder to get there.”

Newport Harbor Coach Nowell Kay also has a good varsity squad, and his seniors proved their mettle yet again Saturday. The Sailors seniors won the team chase in their Division II race, just like they had the previous three years as freshmen, sophomores and juniors. They edged out Valencia, although Kay didn’t know it when he left the meet as team scores weren’t available at the time.

Seniors Scott Figueroa and Alex Crawford didn’t race due to injury, but Jake Dawson (11th in 15:21) and Michael Taylor (12th, 15:39) each had good finishes to help the cause. It was a good start for the team, which finished seventh in Division II last year at the CIF State Meet.

“The weather was perfect,” Kay said. “It was nice to get races in.”

Estancia’s Jorge Martin was sixth in the Division III junior boys’ race, in 15:45. It was a strong local race; Costa Mesa’s James Stucker was ninth in the same race (15:47), followed by Corona del Mar’s Sebastien Welch in 10th (15:48) and Sage Hill’s Lion Wintemute in 14th in 16:06.

“It was a good race,” said Martin, who was first in the Division III freshman race two years ago at Laguna Hills. “During the summer, we train hard for these invitationals. We treat it the same as if it was a league meet race. Our varsity team is pretty good; our goal for this year is to make state.”

Sage Hill freshman Blake Myers won the Division III frosh race in 16:39.

“We had a really good day,” Coach Nate Miller said. “A terrific debut for him.”

Austin Barvin of Corona del Mar finished 11th in the Division III sophomore boys’ race, in 16:36.