Carson hosts invitational

It never hurts to have the home field advantage.

And coach Dennis Brinson hopes that advantage translates into success for the Carson High School cross country team today when it hosts the Carson Invitational. This is one of only two home meets during the season and Brinson says the Senators are looking forward to racing on their home course at Western Nevada Community College.

Call it highly challenging because of the considerable sand and hills that line the 3.1-mile course.

"As far as the race goes, I think we do have home field advantage because we know the course so well," Brinson said. "That's a big advantage on a course like ours because it is a challenging course mentally and physically because there are a lot of transitions."

The meet starts at 3:30 p.m. with the J.V. boys race at WNCC. The last race of the day will be the varsity girls, scheduled for a 5 p.m. start.

Several Northern 4A teams, including traditional power Galena, are expected to compete, which makes this a gauge for the Northern 4A Regional Championships on Oct. 28 at Rancho San Rafael Park in Reno.

Galena's boys should present a formidable challenge with a team led by the trio of Daniel Geib, Raul Tibaduiza and Michael Van Antwerp, who were among the top 11 finishers at last year's regional championships. The Grizzlies finished fourth as a team among Division II schools at the Stanford Invitational last month.

Among the absentees will be Reno and South Tahoe girls teams - Reno is ranked No. 17 in the nation and No. 4 in the Southwest by Nike and South Tahoe is listed No. 5 in the Southwest - which will run on Saturday at the high-powered 26th Clovis Invitational at Woodward Park in Fresno. The South Tahoe and Reno boys are also entered in the California meet.

More important than the results from today's meet, Brinson wants to take a step toward preparing for the regional meet. Two teams and five individuals from non-qualifying teams will qualify for the state championships on Nov. 6 in Boulder City.

"We want to try and peak for regionals and state," Brinson said. "Hopefully, everybody will be healthy and ready to run because the goal is to qualify as many kids for state as we can. And we'd like to be represented at state on both the boys and girls sides."

Freshman Christy Works and junior Annie Brinson have emerged as leaders for the Carson girls, while senior Ryan Turner and sophomore Chad Shroy have been leaders for the boys. Overall, Brinson pointed out that several runners are jockeying to crack the top seven on the girls and boys teams to qualify to run at the regional meet.

"The intersquad competition is going to be pretty intense because the kids know that these last couple of weeks will determine who's going to run (at regionals) and they're trying for those positions," the coach said.

The Senators are scheduled to run at the Elko Invitational on Oct. 16 and then in a league meet at Damonte Ranch on Oct. 20 leading up to the regional meet.

Contact Dave Price at dprice@nevadaappeal.com or call 881-1220.