Prep Update: New #1's and Finnerty's Top-3

Saturday's Roy Griak Invitational was a bit like a cross country blender: lots of nice harrier ingredients went in and stuff came out well and newly mixed. Good teams ran great; good teams ran poorly. Individuals have fine days ... and days they're eager to put behind them.

You can watch video of the whole cooking show HERE via Flotrack.

The Minnesota high school rankings show the effects of all the processing this week. Brand new #1's top both Class AA polls. Griak Gold Division champions Wayzata hold the top spot for boys. The Trojans have been a well-respected #2 since the first meet of the season. Wayzata's ascension came in tandem with former #1 Rosemount's decline at Griak. The Irish finished 7th in the Gold hampered by Obai Hussein's pained DNF in the race. The Irish fall to #3. Brainerd, 5th at Griak, is ranked #2. Stillwater, not at Griak, is #4 and Edina, 8th there, is #5.

It will be interesting to see how the NTN Heartland region rankings change off of Griak. Look for those ratings to appear later in the week.

In Girls Class AA, Eden Priairie which eschewed Griak, assumes the top spot in the ratings, a spot they've seemed deserving of since the Faribault Invitational. Burnsville is now #2 after knocking off previous #1 Brainerd at Griak -- the Blaze finished 4th in the Griak Gold, Brainerd was 7th. Burnsville is the cross country equivalent of a really small town -- blink and you miss them! They sported a 10 second 1-5 spread at Griak! Minnetonka, White Bear Lake, and Lakeville North are now #3, #4, and #5 in the ratings.

(If you're not busy this afternoon, you can watch the #1, #2, #4, and #5 ranked Class AA Girls teams in action in Chaska!)

Class A team ratings remained largely unchanged -- Perham and Adrian still lead the way. The biggest shift was prompted by Donny Wasinger of Winona Cotter's defeat of Kevin Lachowitzer of Perham at Griak. Wasinger is now the #1 individual in Class A boys, with Lachowitzer falling to #2.

Finnerty's Choices ...

Along with the race videos on Flotrack, there are some nice interviews ... including this one with Gold Division individual champ Rob Finnerty. I'm probably doing what they call "burying the lead" in this post, but Finnerty reveals that he's narrowed his college choices to Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Oregon.

I wouldn't mind covering him at close range as a Gopher. Torchia, Mead, Finnerty ... sounds like the heart of a killer team in the autumn of 2009!