SALINAS—A year ago, Monica Ruelas was melancholic as she left Toro Park, having run a subpar race by her standards.
Saturday, the Gilroy High sophomore was nothing but smiles. Returning to the scene of what she called was one of the least satisfying races of her career, Ruelas came full circle, capturing the individual title in the Monterey Bay League Pacific Division Cross Country Championships.
“This year I had more confidence in myself, and that made all the difference,” said Ruelas, whose time of 21 minutes, 11 seconds beat the second-place finisher by 14 seconds and earned her a spot in the Nov. 15 Central Coast Section Championships, which will also be held at Toro Park. “I wanted it really bad and I just knew I had to push it harder.”
In the 2013 league championships, Ruelas didn’t feel great from the get-go, finishing in fifth place. But with another year of experience, Ruelas came to the starting line feeling fresh both mentally and physically.
Toro Park doesn’t have a very steep hill but rather several smaller ones and that’s where Ruelas did her work, eventually making the winning pass on an uphill climb.
“Hill climbing is one of my strengths,” she said. “This year I knew I had to work harder, be more disciplined and keep the confidence up. I’m very happy with the results here because this is my favorite course.”
Ruelas was one of a handful of runners from Gilroy and Christopher who excelled in Saturday’s race. Ruelas’ teammate, freshman sensation Briseida Perez, placed fourth in a time of 21:44. Perez also will be going to CCS with Ruelas.
Christopher had only two girls in the race—Natalie Filippi and Vicky Fox—but they finished in sixth and 11th place, respectively. Although Filippi hasn’t set a PR since her freshman year, the junior already had visions for a more successful senior season.
“I started off really fast today, which is probably not the best idea,” said Filippi, whose time of 22:25 earned her the last CCS individual qualifier spot from the Pacific Division. “That’s why I kind of died at the end. So in my next race (at CCS), I’m going to work on keeping an even pace. I’ve got two weeks to do that.”
Fox also had a solid showing, finishing in 23:13. On the boys side, Gilroy, which went a perfect 3-0 during the regular season, followed that up by winning the team title in narrow fashion on Saturday, totaling 48 points to Alvarez’s 54.
Unfortunately for the Mustangs, they missed out on going to CCS as a team by an agonizingly narrow margin.
Gilroy’s total team time of 1 hour, 30.12 seconds was just a second slower than Monterey. A head-to-head points formula used to determine the final CCS qualifier from the meet resulted in Monterey totaling 189 points to Gilroy’s 193. That meant had one of Gilroy’s top six runners passed just one more runner during the race, they would’ve leapfrogged Monterey for the CCS berth.
“It’s one of those lessons you learn the hard way,” Mustangs coach Cathy Silva said. “The boys had a lot to be proud of for running a good race, and they competed well. They knew it was going to be tough and they almost made it, but it was a good lesson to learn.”
Gilroy actually put seven runners in the race—the top five count for score and the sixth is used just in case for tiebreaker purposes—and six established PRs. Senior Sean Kaufman led the charge with a solid third-place showing in 17:28, which broke his previous record at Toro by 30 seconds.
Fellow senior Kairo Barroso finished in fifth in 17:35, and both he and Kaufman earned CCS individual bids. Other top-20 finishers included sophomores Jonathan Viveros (eighth) and Eric Heiser (13th), as they finished in 18:02 and 18:20 respectively, and junior Michael Kropff, who was 19th in 18:47.
Kaufman chalked up his excellent finish to the competition.
“The competition kept me going and I kept my pace off of them,” he said. “Last year I missed CCS by five seconds, so if I end up going, it would be great. This is one of the best races of my career, something I’m very satisfied with. I’ve learned to pace myself better as a cross-country runner, but it was hard because for track season I’m a sprinter, and you’re used to going out fast and finishing fast. For longer distances I needed to even out my splits (similar times for each mile), and it’s paid off in a big way.”
Christopher’s best finisher was nothing short of a surprise in freshman Austin Hudson, who placed 18th overall in 18:32. Not only did Hudson take a whopping two minutes off his previous personal best at Toro, but he did it in the most unconventional of ways—by playing basketball.
The boys race didn’t start until 12:45 p.m., and Hudson was at Christopher High from 9-11 a.m. playing a game of pickup basketball. Realizing he was running—pun intended—a bit late, Hudson sprinted back home, which is a mile or two away from Christopher.
Hudson, who was usually the Cougars’ third best finisher during the regular season, admitted he couldn’t explain why he had a career defining race.
“I don’t know, maybe my legs were really warmed up from playing basketball and running home,” he said. “I didn’t expect to do this good, and was thinking I’d place somewhere in the 30s or 40s. I was actually kind of tired this morning, and was thinking to myself, ‘Ah, I’ve got to do this meet.’ But at the starting line I was extra pumped up for a reason. I did tell my coach (Lori Romero) what I did before I got here, and she said maybe I should play basketball more often before a race.”
