COTTONWOOD, CA - It was two years ago when the last section meet was held on the storied West Valley cross country course. It has been much longer that that since the course held standing water when the section meet was contested on it. While the weather conditions were idea for racing, stretches of mud or standing water made the race more challenging.

The varsity boys race was up first. Chico and Pleasant Valley were easily the class of the field. The Panthers dominated the Vikings by small margins until the Eastern Athletic League Championships in which the tables were turned with PV coming out on top. This time Chico would be at full strength with Nate Solecki returning after a brief illness.

Boys 3 Mile Championship

Chico High cross country runner Mario Giannini has been the anchor of the Northern Section throughout his high school career. Giannini won the Northern Section race his sophomore season in 2019, and after his junior season was canceled due to the pandemic Giannini, now a senior, has picked up where he left off by winning consistently during his senior campaign and puntuating it with a course record on Chico's home course at the EAL Championships. In 10 races in the fall 2021 season, Giannini has seven first-place finishes, one second-place finish and one third-place finish. His most recent victory came in the Eastern Athletic League Championship November 4th at Hooker Oak Park in Chico.

Pleasant Valley senior runner Tryon Jardin, who finished second in Wednesday's CIF Northern Section Finals race at West Valley High School in Cottonwood, said that runners were competing for second place knowing that Giannini would almost certainly finish first. Giannini, a senior, lived up to the hype Wednesday, winning the section final race in 15 minutes and 29.18 seconds - 37.2 seconds ahead of the second place Jardin, who finished in 16:07.38. Jardin's teammate Renton McGregor finished third in 16:24.02.

In Jardin's sophomore season he was not running as one of PV's top runners. In fact he improved more than 3 minutes from what he ran in 2019, probably more than anyone else. The senior said throughout the pandemic he worked extremely hard and trained with his teammates despite an abbreviated junior year of competition (last spring). Jardin and McGregor have been battling all season long behind Giannini with Jardin recently taking over as PV's top runner.

Though Giannini took the top spot in the individual race, PV finished as the top team in the Northern Section Finals race Wednesday. The battle between the crosstown rivals was close until Chico's Avery Miunson Clark, who was battling Mt Shasta's Drew Hering and Yreka's Henry Baun for fifth with a mile to go, faded due to some health issues. The Vikings finished with 29 points, Chico High finished second with 41 points, University Prep finished third with 94, Yreka fourth with 104 points and Enterprise fifth with 162 points. Colusa finished sixth, Foothill seventh, Trinity eighth, Red Bluff ninth, Orland 10th, Shasta 11th, Live Oak 12th, Corning 13th, Durham 14th and Oroville 15th.

Pleasant Valley had five of its 10 runners finish in the top 11 in the race. After Jardin and McGregor, freshman Jackson Hein finished ninth, sophomore Cavin Muff finished 10th and Cristofer Velazquez-Patino finished 11th. Mark Velazquez-Patino finished 21st for the Vikings, Brandon Underwood finished 26th and Austin Hein finished 31st. Giannini was backed up by teammates Benjamin Wun finished sixth for the Panthers, Nate Solecki finished 12th, Robert Moncrief finished 14th, Avery Munson Clark finished 15th, Daniel Morlet finished 18th and Carter Murphy finished 19th. Others finishing in the top ten were Yreka sophomore Henry Baun in fourth, Mt Shasta's Drew Hering in fifth, Weed's Ryan Mitchell in seventh and UPrep's Noah Gaido, the race's first freshman finisher, in eigth.

Giannini said he was aiming for a faster time, hoping to finish with the second fastest time ever on the West Valley course. He said muddy conditions did play a part in the time but was not making excuses and said he was still happy with the win.

"It was definitely a lot more wet today than my sophomore year. That year it was quite dry but the mud is just part of the race," Giannini said. "I just didn't have it today I guess. At the one mile mark I was off pace (editors note: the opening/closing mile had the most mud) so I guess I just didn't get off to a fast enough pace at the start."



Girls 3 Mile Championship

Girls from across the Northern Section negotiated their way through a 3-mile hilly course filled with muddy trails Wednesday at West Valley High School in Cottonwood to determine the section cross country championship and state qualifiers. The Panthers, who are ranked No. 8 in California, claimed the only DIII Northern Section spot in the 2021 CIF State Cross Country Championships in winning the section title with low score of 30 points over distant runnerup Pleasant Valley's 105 points. There were only nine schools who ran with complete teams in this year's section championships, a little more than half as many that competed pre-pandemic. To score teams only need to have five runners finishing the race.

The Molina twins led Chico High to a first-place team finish and will now head to the state championship to race once more together. No surprise since Chico High cross country runners and twin sisters Iresh and Della Molina have run side by side nearly their entire senior year. "It is really special because we keep going back and forth between Della first, then I'm first, and then for league Della won so it was kind of cool that we both traded," Iresh Molina said. "In this one I won sections."

The seniors did not begin running competitively until their freshman year, and despite being aggressive racers, both acknowledge they often take having a set running/racing partner for granted. The Molina twins began the fall cross country season running in the preseason team time trial and finishing 1-2 with Iresh taking first. Iresh then beat her sister in the season opener in Folsom before Della reeled off six straight (minus one tie) over her sister that culminated with a win at the Eastern Athletic League meet on Nov. 4, Della Molina defeated her sister there by three seconds. However six days later Iresh Molina defeated Della by 1.43 seconds on Wednesday in the CIF Northern Section Finals race at West Valley High School. Both sister finished with stellar times on the West Valley course. Iresh Molina finished in 18:44.97 a mark that is 10th best all-time while Della Molina finished in 18:46.40 with is 11th all-time. It also represents the first time ever that two athletes (much less two sisters) from the same school broke 19 minutes on the section course.

The two have learned that Iresh is the stronger starter and a little better at maintaining her pace, while Della has a better kick to finish her races strong. "It's amazing and we would not be near as fast without each other," Iresh Molina said Wednesday. "I had to run a couple of track races without her and it was significantly more difficult because I was like 'What do I do? I don't know how fast to run or where to go?'"

Behind the Panthers 30 points in the team competition were Pleasant Valley 105 points, Las Plumas 110 points, University Prep 114 points, Orland 120 points fifth, Sutter 134 points sixth, Fall River 144 points seventh, Red Bluff 161 points eighth and Colusa 206 poins finished ninth. After the Molina sisters, Chico High place finishers were Una Griffith finished fifth, Dot Clemente finished 12th, Tori Mackay finished 15th, Eleace Kincaid finished 24th in the 97 person race. The second-place team PV was led by a fourth place finish of Chloe Alchin who finished in 19:40.51, Henley Roy finished 41st, Nikalette Fashing 42nd, Ali Lugo in 49th, Grace Montgomery 51st and Sofia Perez 55th. The Vikings would have been more competitive if Faylinn Berkowitz, their number one runner at league, hadn't decided to skip the meet for a soccer match.

Della Molina discussed her thoughts on PV and Chico competing first and second in the Northern Section nearly all year long. "I think it's awesome because it's like they're our rivals, but when you think about it it's like really a proud thing for the schools from our town be so good," Della Molina said.



Others filling out the top ten were UPrep's Becca Gaido, the runnerup in 2019, was third, Shasta freshman Elizabeth Merrill took 6th, Orland freshman Paris Esther, who began the season competing in junior varsity races, finished seventh. Sutter's Gabrielle Katz was eigth, UPrep freshman Lyndsey Schuster claimed ninth with Yreka's Augustine Mylan rounding out the top ten. Madalyn Robertson, the top finisher for Las Plumas, finished in 11th place. Orland's Cameron Phillips finished 25th.

Those teams & individuals that qualified for the state that will take place Nov. 27 at Woodward Park in Fresno are as follows;

Individual state qualifiers for the girls were:
D-III - PV's Chloe Achin, Shasta's Elizabeth Merrill and Foothill's Natalie Molz.
D-IV - Sutter's Gabrielle Katz, Dara Schmidt & Kayle Duncan, Yreka's Augustine Mylan, Christie Charlotta & Ara Shackleford, Enterprise's Tobi Dendas & Gisela Cruz Montes
D-V - Enta's Jenna Justice, Fall River's Darcy Range, Mt Shasta's Sylva Carpenter and CV's Marisa Doers,

Girls team qualifiers: Chico in D-III, Las Plumas & Orland in D-IV, U-Prep in D-V.

Individual state qualifiers for the boys were:
D-III - No individual qualifers, top twelve finisher in division were all from Chico & Pleasant Valley
D-IV - Orland's Jesse Hicks, Wheatland's Antonio Palma.
D-V - Mt Shasta's Drew Hering, Weed's Ryan Mitchell, Live Oak's Stephan Chapdelaine, CORE Butte's Christian Robinson and Colusa's Kevin Sarabia.

Boys team qualifiers: Pleasant Valley, Chico in D-III, Yreka, Enterprise in D-IV, U-Prep in D-V.