Wayzata Wins Class AA Boys Convincingly; Finnerty Wins Individual Crown

In the Class AA boys’ race, top-ranked Wayzata took the title, boasting a meet-best top five spread of 29.1 seconds. Jeremy Dreckhahn and Danny Ducharme led the Trojans, finishing 5th and 7th respectively in the team competition. Wayzata scored just 62 points ahead of Rosemount’s 110 and Brainerd’s 147. Rosemount, who entered the day ranked 2nd in Class AA, rallied behind a 2nd-place finish (1st in the teem meet) by Jordan Carlson. “I was just trying to get first place in the team scores, that’s all I really wanted to do. If that meant 3rd place overall, 2nd place overall, whatever it took for that,” he said.

Wayzata head coach Bill Miles acknowledged the hard work of his entire team. “We’ve got a lot of talented kids, talented kids that don’t even get to race today.” He credited his team’s pack running the fact that his athletes are comfortable running together. “They’re all capable of running under 10 for two miles, and so that makes it pretty easy to be together as a pack and going through the mile in 5 [minutes]."

Miles downplayed the effect of a disappointing 3^rd place finish at the Section 6AA meet last season. “We focus on this year, and the whole point is these guys work really hard to be good,” he said. “They’re so excited to have a chance to be able to race. We’re proud of what we did last year and we’re proud of what we did the year before that but it’s about this season, and the work that they did to get ready to race."

The top two individuals have grown familiar with each other over the last few weeks, and Carlson has seen plenty of Rob Finnerty’s backside, finishing second to the Burnsville senior in both the Lake Conference Championships and the Section 3AA meet. However, in those meets Finnerty ran away from the field, winning by 46 and 48 seconds respectively. Today, Finnerty took the race out hard in 4:42 for the first mile, but could not keep up his blistering pace. Carlson said he was “really surprised” to be within striking distance in the last 800 meters of the race, but with 600 meters to go, Finnerty took a peek over his shoulder, he told DtB, saw Carlson coming, and pounded the last quarter-mile to win in 15:28.8. Carlson clocked 15:37.8 in front of Pieter Gangnon of Minneapolis Washburn, who finished 3^rd in 15:44.5.

Finnerty was happy with the win, but his performance was not what he expected of himself. “I went out a little bit hot, it’s just hard to do on your own and I just wasn’t feeling it today,” he said. “My plan was to go out really hard and try to hold it. I just couldn’t do it.” He ran about 4:41 for the first mile and was all alone. After the race he told DtB he was aiming to run 4:45 for the opening 1600 meters. “I got a lot of adrenaline going, from the fans and I went out a little harder then I wanted to go."

After finishing 2^nd as a freshman, he did not run in the section meet as a sophomore due to a stress fracture. Finnerty finished 4^th in last year’s state meet. “I wasn’t going to leave high school without a cross country title."

For those anxiously awaiting Finnerty’s college decision, he said he hopes to make an announcement “in the next couple weeks."

Full Results

Photo of Finnerty by Gene Niemi.