Wednesday, October 17 – Region 18 Cross Country Championships:
Kenidee Glazier repeats as a Region Champion while Austin Church punches his ticket to state as well. Boys and Girls teams from Beaver, Enterprise, Kanab, Millard, Parowan, South Sevier and Water Canyon travelled to sunny southern Utah to compete in the 2023 Region 18 Cross Country Championships. The meet was held at the Thunderbird Golf Course in Mt. Caramel for the 5th consecutive year.
Left to right, photos by Samantha LeFevre:
Austin Church keeps his cool during a blistering start to the 2A boys race.
Silver Henderson guts out one of her best finishes of the season! - Cooper Troy and Harry Williams battle down the homestretch. - Teammates Mason Roundy, focused as he powers up the course.
Glazier and Kasprick go stride for stride during an intense 2A State Championship race.
Glazier defended her title, running a time of 18:16.1 on the 5k course, beating all other competition by over 2.5 minutes as well as beating her own time previous time. Second place was Kyra Moat of Millard with a time of 20:49.1 and third was Esther Nielsen of Water Canyon with a time of 21:05.0.
Teammate Silver Henderson was the next Lady Cowboy across the finish line in 12th place with a time of 24:07.0. Henderson has had a fantastic Freshman season, cutting her times down each week and turning in great workouts with an even better attitude. She will continue to improve and will be one to watch in the upcoming years.
The third Lady Cowboy across the line was Freshman Charity Bowman in 19th with a time of 24:48.8. Bowman, typically seen with her signature smile, has brought a lot to this Cowboy team and will be great to have back for the next three years.
Fourth and fifth finishers were Brooklyn Bauer in 30th with a time of 27:13.4 and Mikkel Jones in 42nd with a time of 31:30.20. Kayley Brinkerhoff rounded out the Lady Cowboy team with a time of 32:59.0. The girls finished sixth overall as a team.
Church led the boys’ team with a top 10 finish of 8th place and a time of 17:31.7. Top 10 finishers are automatically awarded an individual birth at the State Championships, and we are proud to have Austin represent the Cowboys. Church has arguably put in the most time leading up to this season and his hard work paid off in a big way. He is becoming a great runner and team leader for KHS Cross Country.
The second Cowboy across the line was Mason Roundy with a 24th place finish and time of 18:57.2. Roundy has improved immensely in his sophomore season and will continue to be an essential part of the Cowboy team in years to come.
Runners three, four and five for the Cowboys were Braxton Brown (29th overall) with a time of 19:51.2, Cooper Troy (42nd overall) with a time of 21:00.4 and Harry Williams (43rd) with a time of 21:02.1, with Nathan Unsworth, Kyle Brown and Levi Clarkson rounding out the varsity squad. The Cowboys placed sixth overall as a team and will continue to build for next year.
The young Kanab Cowboys, who did not compete in the Varsity race, ran a great final race of the season during the JV portion of the meet. Five of the eight Cowboy runners ran a seasonal best, led by Freshman Luke Shakespeare. Kai Icenogle and Shakespeare both PR’d by over a minute! Other runners, Elijah Heaton, Jayden Glover, Mason Barber, JJ Williams, Kyan Lyman and Emrey Roundy all ran great races as well.
Tuesday, October 24 – UHSAA State Cross Country Championships:
The 2023 State Cross Country Championships had some of the toughest competition, we’ve seen to date. Reigning 2022 2A champion Kenidee Glazier (Sophomore – 15 years old) had her work cut out for her, due to this year’s realignment which brought Grand County High School down from 3A to compete in the 2A division. Glazier and the top Grand County runner, Cadence Kasprick (Senior – 19 years old), went stride for stride for the first half of the race. At mile two, Kaspirck pulled away and was able to hold onto the lead to finish line, running a blistering time of 17:49.7, winning her first State Cross Country title. Glazier’s second place finishing time of 18:15.5 was a 12 second improvement from her 2022 state winning time and a seasonal best for the Sophomore and makes her one of the top 15 runners in the state of Utah across all divisions.
If you’ve never seen Kenidee run, you are missing out, but more impressively, you should see her ability to mentally and physically prepare herself for competition. Glazier is proud of her efforts in the race, stating that she doesn’t think she could have given any more during the competition. The sophomore shows mental toughness and poise, well beyond her years. We can’t wait to see what this driven, humble, amazing ath- lete does in years to come.
Austin Church faced off against some tough competition on the boy’s side as well. The Junior had great composure from the moment the gun went off, and went on to run the best race of his career. Church has run this state course several times. Last year as a sophomore, Church placed 47th overall with a time of 19:24.8 and earlier in the season he ran a 18:06.0 during the Pre-State meet. His 2023 state time of 17:11.2 was a good enough to place him 11th overall and is the fourth fastest time turned in by a Cowboy on a State course in school history. Austin will be returning next year to lead the Cowboys again, he has put in hours and hours of work and we want to congratulate him on a fantastic finish to his season.
