Seniors show toughness

ORANGE — On a three-mile course, two local high school seniors battled fatigue and their reasons varied.

Corona del Mar’s Melanie Powers ran with the flu and Costa Mesa’s James Stucker ran without enough sleep.

The two still managed to record the area’s best finishes at the 43rd annual Orange County Cross Country Championships at Irvine Regional Park on a warm Saturday morning.

Powers placed fifth with a time of 17 minutes, 24 seconds in the girls’ sweepstakes race, helping the Sea Kings to their second straight seventh-place showing at the event.

Stucker finished seventh in 16:07 as the Mustangs took 13th place in the Division III boys’ race.

While Powers really couldn’t do much to relieve her fever and muscle aches, Stucker made things tough on himself.

The night before, Stucker attended Costa Mesa’s Battle for the Bell rivalry football game against Estancia. Instead of watching the game from the stands, Coach Chuck Lester saw his No. 1 runner next to the cheerleaders on the all-weather track at Estancia High.

“He was doing back flips, helping the cheerleaders,” Lester said. “I said, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me? We have a meet [Saturday morning].’ He’s a real team spirited guy. He can be the mascot.

“I joked around with [my runners], ‘All you need to be home by 9.’ ”

Stucker said he went to bed before midnight. For someone with an early wake-up call Saturday, he improved on last year’s finish at the county finals.

Stucker moved up three spots and cut three seconds off his time. Not bad for someone performing at least 10 back flips during Costa Mesa’s 27-13 win in the Orange Coast League opener Friday night.

“I feel I can do better next time,” said Stucker, knowing he won’t have a football game to attend the night before the next meet.

The upcoming race is the Mt. San Antonio College Invitational in Walnut Friday. Stucker will participate as will Powers and other local runners.

The Sea Kings, ranked No. 2 in the CIF Southern Section Division III coaches’ poll, are looking to get healthy. Powers overcame the flu and she topped last year’s seventh-place result and slashed 10 seconds off her time at the county finals.

The flu bug has hit the squad, but CdM competed to the end with only five runners finishing the most competitive girls’ race of the morning.

Top-ranked Orange Lutheran won the event with 61 points, Dana Hills (84) finished second, followed by Trabuco Hills (89) and Esperanza (91).

CdM Coach Bill Sumner expects the times of Marisa Cummings (18:37, 31st), Kristina Funahashi (18:59, 45th), Shelby Perez (19:03, 50th) and Ashlee Powers (19:07, 55th) to improve.

“We’re better this year than we were last year,” said Sumner, who in 2008 led the Sea Kings to their fifth straight CIF Southern Section Division III title and the program’s sixth CIF state championship. “We’re better, but Orange Lutheran is also better this year. They beat three Division I teams ranked in the top [six]. They were up there [Saturday], but they’re not out of reach.

“We’ll be there at the end. We don’t back down.”

Out of the four local varsity schools at the county finals, the Newport Harbor girls’ team turned in the best showing in terms of place.

The Sailors took fourth in the Division II event, which was won by Sunset League foe Fountain Valley. Sage Hill placed ninth in Division III, the race Costa Mesa didn’t have enough runners to compete as a team. Beckman won Division III.

Leading Newport Harbor was Maggie Goodson (18:54, 14th), Tori Sarris (19:12, 23rd), Patty Moddelmog (19:31, 35th), Lauren Clemence (20:04, 58th) and Ava Nelson (20:09, 64th). The Sailors improved on last year’s last-place showing in the sweepstakes race at the county finals.

Three local runners cracked the top 20 in Division III. Costa Mesa’s Hunter Strodel was 13th in 20:17, followed by teammate Kaitlin Yamamoto (17th, 20:36), and Sage Hill’s Sophia Witte (20th, 20:41).

In the boys’ races involving local teams, CdM ran in the sweepstakes event and finished 13th. Dana Hills, ranked No. 4 in Division I, ran away with the title.

Austin Barvin finished 38th in 15:59, the Sea Kings’ best showing.

Newport Harbor finished 10th in Division II, which was won by University. Alex Jolly was the Sailors’ top runner, taking 25th place in 16:13.

In Division III, Sage Hill placed 11th, two spots ahead of Costa Mesa. Tustin claimed the title.

Dylan Thies recorded the best mark for the Lightning, finishing in 16:57 for 28th place.