Gabrielle foils ACS in Cross Country race

Multi-sport athlete Gabrielle Race beat a platoon of Agape Christian School runners to finish on top of the podium in the 2015 All Schools Cross Country race finale held last Saturday at the Airport Field.

Gabrielle Race, right, of Marianas High School capped her high school career with a second straight All Schools Cross Country crown as she again topped last Saturday’s final race at the Airport Field. (Jon Perez)

Race, who was the only female runner not wearing an ACS uniform, topped the girls U18 division to lead five others who finished first in their respective age groups.

She finished the 3.2-mile (5.2 kilometers), three-lap course in 23:47, shaving off more than one minute of her third leg time of 24:11.

The Marianas High School bet, also a member of the three-time Marianas Interscholastic Sports Organization basketball champions Lady Dolphins, also broke her last year’s winning time of 30:24.

Race, who played tennis as a youngster, was more than five minutes ahead of her closest pursuer as she prevented any of the 14 other ACS runners to end up first.

Sophie Shi, a two-time runner-up in the first two legs this year, was the fastest ACS female runner at 29:12 followed by teammates Song Chae (29:45), Ruth Wang (30:07), and Candy Tang (3-29).

Three-leg winner Tiffany Yang came in sixth place with 31:11 as she still participated even though she’s suffering from an injured foot. Her best time was 27:02 in the final leg last week, which could have good for second place behind race.

ACS bounced back in the U15 division with a sweep of the Top 3 positions with Hopwood Middle School duplicating the feat in the U13 age group.

Joy Lyu led an all-ACS podium finish in the girls U15 as she clocked 18:27 after the 2.1-mile (3.3k) course for middle school runners.

Sookie Xu Lingling came in second (19:25), while Sarah Wu was third (19:51). Esther Li, another ACS bet, was fourth at 21:00 followed by Saipan Southern High School teammates Rae Min (26:06) and Lucy Gu (28:25).

Hopwood’s Conatsu Kaga bested teammates Therize Millari and Ruschell Valino for the girls U13 crown. She logged 13:57 for a 3:20 lead over Millari (17:17), while Valino submitted a 17:46.

Saipan Community School’s Desrei Camacho (20:22), ACS’ Annie Wong (21:10), and Nicole Kim also of SCS (21:28) complete the U13’s Top 6 finishers.

Coume Kaga, Conatsu’s sister, was the fastest in the U11 division submitting a time of 6:38 after the one-mile run (1.6k) for elementary students.

Her time was far better than the ones she posted in the three legs she participated in—6:43 in the opener, 6:42 in the second, and 6:44 in the third.

Grace Christian Academy’s Soleil Lamar, the fourth leg winner, was in second place at 7:18. It was also her third time to finish second behind Kaga as she was also a runner-up in the first (8:00) and second (7:20) legs, respectively.

Hopwood’s Janelle Saluta (7:28), Hana Ojima of SCS, ACS’ Elizabeth Xu (7:40), and Jzl Santomin also of Hopwwod (8:25) finished third to sixth places, respectively.

The U9 girls Top 6 were William S. Reyes School’s Jasmine Saluta (9:17) and Princess Jose (9:24), SCS’ Jenny Zhang (9:51), Mt. Carmel School’s Quimari Duenas (11:26), and Angela Maratas (12:06) and Erish Carreon (12:27) also of WSR.

SCS runners also swept the U7 girls division with Kilah Bacani (8:30), Abbie Kim (9:49), and Ye Jie Zhang (9:57) in the Top 3 followed by San Vicente Elementary School’s Phoenix Gross (10:05) her sister Beatrice Gross (10:53), SCS’ You Na Li (12:01).

ACS also won the U18 team trophy, while SCS topped the U11 division with 48 points.