Penguins Compete at Havre Invitational: LaBrie takes third with new best, Wisher fourth

The Whitewater Penguins attended the Havre Invitational on Saturday. I was very optimistic going into this meet. The weather was going to be absolutely gorgeous and the girls had a solid week of practice.

We arrived at the course and the girls did their run through and began doing form run at about seven minutes before ten o'clock. I was kind of just hanging out around the golf house when I overheard the Havre coach quickly tell the Malta coaches that the girls race is first not second. This was much to our surprise as the schedule had said we were second.

I yelled for the girls, they scrambled to get their bibs on and run to the starting line. I yelled at them to use the adrenaline in the race!

I ran to mile one to wait for the girls. Shelbi LaBrie came through at about 6:19 and I thought, oh boy that’s a little fast, crossing my fingers she could keep it up. It’s a little early in the season for her to be able to sustain a split like that.

Sammi Wisher came around at about 6:46, once again a little faster than I wanted. Ava followed at about 9:30. I stuck around to watch the end of mile two because it’s a two loop course.

My mouth kind of dropped when the two Glasgow girls came around the corner and Shelbi was still right there! And, then behind her came Sammi.

I ran to the 400 meter mark to push the girls at the end. I was kind of speechless at this point. Their finishes were amazing. All three girls kicked very well in that last stretch, using girls ahead of them as targets.

All three of them were so happy with their performances, and on top of it, said that they felt great. Their smiles made my day. Shelbi ended in third place with a time of 19.41, which if you think about it, is pretty amazing that we have that many runners on this side of the state with times that low. We are so fortunate for the competition we have over here. This was a huge PR for her by almost a full minute from last year.

Sammi came in 4th with a time of 20.51. She had mentioned before the race that she would like a high of 21 for the day and ended up shattering that. This is so close to a new PR for her and she’s set some awesome goals for the upcoming meets.

Ava Hanley came in 43rd with a time of 30.25, a little bit slower than last weekend. We’ve been trying not to overdo her workouts with her coming off of a knee surgery this last spring. I think it can be a little scary recovering from that and then hopping into cross country. We're going to get her down into the 20’s by the end of the year, just very carefully.

My other senior, Kendra Cummings, was with us at the meet cheering the girls on and coaching right along with me. We’ve been nursing some leg issues, trying not to make them worse than they already are. We're confident she will be able to ease back into the workouts and be ready to compete with the girls at state.

Overall, we were very happy with the weekend, the other local teams also competed well. We’re always cheering for Malta, Hinsdale, and Dodson as well!

Great job to all the athletes. We head to Missoula this next weekend to run on the U of M Golf Course.