Montgomery’s Hanne Thomsen leads Sonoma cross country state parade

Sonoma County will be sending four teams and more than 30 runners to the CIF State Cross Country Championships next weekend, as locals turned in some impressive marks at Saturday’s North Coast Section meet at Hayward High School.

Among the local qualifiers were two individual section champions: Montgomery sophomore Hanne Thomsen, who repeated as the NCS Division 3 girls champion; and Sonoma Academy senior Tiernan Colby, who brought home the NCS Division 5 boys title.

Maria Carrillo will also be sending its boys and girls teams to the state finals for the 11th straight season, while the Montgomery girls will be joining them in their first trip to Fresno since 2006. The Sonoma Academy boys round out the local teams that booked a trip to state with Saturday’s performances.

GIRLS

Like she has the entirety of her still-young career, Thomsen stole the show.

She breezed her way to the Division 3 title with a time of 16 minutes, 30.6 seconds — more than 30 seconds ahead of second place on the hilly, three-mile course at Hayward High School. It was the fastest time of the day and was not only a course and meet record for Division 3, but ranked as No. 2 all-time for girls in course and meet history.

“It was definitely faster than I thought I was going to run today, but it was definitely more effort-based today,” Thomsen said. “I just wanted to feel strong. I came through (one mile) in like 5:30 and then the second mile was also like 5:30 and I thought, ‘OK, I can probably run a little faster than I thought.’”

Thomsen will look to defending her Division 3 state title next week.

Thomsen was also one of three Vikings who finished in the top 10 in Saturday’s Division 3 race. Behind her were fellow sophomores Seelah Kittlestrom (fifth, 17:59.6) and Amrie Lacefield (seventh, 18:02.4), helping lead the Vikings to a second-place finish behind Campolindo, the top-ranked Division 3 team in the state.

“Specifically for today, our goal was to get second,” Montgomery head coach Melody Karpinski said. “It was a little dicey with the scoring, a little nerve-wracking — I’m not sure if I was more stressed out last night or today during the race — but the girls really came through, especially our fourth- and fifth-place runners. They really showed who they were today and I’m really proud of them.”

Maria Carrillo took fourth in the Division 3 team race behind top-20 finishes from Gracie Trenam (sixth, 18:00.9) and Rebekah Taylor (19th, 19:09). Petaluma’s Riley Kreutz, the Vine Valley Athletic League champion, also secured a state bid as an individual with a 16th-place finish in 19:04.3.

In one of the earlier races of the day, Sonoma Academy junior Athena Ryan and Cardinal Newman senior Siena Brunetti both qualified for state with strong runs in the Division 5 race.

Ryan finished fifth in 18:34.9, while Brunetti was the final individual qualifier, finishing 12th overall in a time of 19:06.8.

“I’m really excited,” Ryan said of qualifying for state. “I was scared that I wasn’t going to. I figured I should, but I was really nervous, so I’m glad to get that out of the way. Now it’s just do what I can next week.”

“I spent a lot of time training for this,” said Brunetti, who had never run competitively in high school until this fall. “This year I realized it was something I really wanted to do.”

BOYS

In Division 5, Colby’s effort also helped Sonoma Academy finish fifth overall in the team competition and advance to state. He was the NCS Division 5 runner-up last year and battled a tight pack for most of Saturday’s race until he pulled away for a nine-second win in 15:00.6.

“I expected, coming in second last year, to qualify,” Colby said. “But I really wanted to prove I’m that fast.”

Colby was one of a few local boys who turned heads at Hayward.

Montgomery’s Max Azevedo was maybe the biggest surprise of the day. He finished seventh overall in a stacked field in Division 3 with a time of 15:59.8, shattering his previous personal best on the course by nearly two minutes.

“It was probably one of the best feelings of my life,” Azevedo said of crossing the finish line. “It’s a dream. I couldn’t ask for anything more.”

Montgomery’s Jude DeVries also qualified for state as an individual, finishing fourth overall in 15:34.6.

Santa Rosa senior Andrew Stevens also ran to an individual qualifying mark of 15:12.6, good for seventh overall in Division 2.

“Last year I think I barely broke 17,” Stevens said. “So this was really amazing. It’s a dream come true.”

Also qualifying as an individual was Healdsburg sophomore Kaeden Anderson, the North Bay League-Redwood champion. He finished ninth in the Division 5 race in a time of 16:02.3

“Ever since last year my goal was to make it to state,” he said. “So this whole year I’ve been focusing on that, got some good teammates and family to help support that. That’s been the goal for the whole year.”

In the final race of the day, Maria Carrillo took second in the Division 3 team race with all seven of their runners placing between Nos. 15 and 32.

“I’m very happy with the results,” Maria Carrillo head coach Greg Fogg said. “The boys coming in second was a spot higher than I had them. … They run a lot together, but today they ran for each other.”

The CIF State Championships will be held next Saturday at Woodward Park in Fresno.