PLEASANTVILLE – North Mahaska sophomore Emmerson Jedlicka competed in one of the most competitive cross country qualifiers in the state Thursday, and captured fourth overall and earned her second trip to the state meet. The NM boys took sixth in the 19-team meet.
The two teams that were ranked coming into the meet did not disappoint. Earlham and Lynnville-Sully took the top two spots in each race. Earlham boys had 61 points and Lynnville-Sully had 60. NM finished with 201. Earlham girls scored 28 and L-S had 46. North Mahaska girls did not have enough runners for a team score.
Jedlicka entered the meet with the goal of making the state field. She and the rest of the field knew they would be chasing Pekin’s Chloe Glosser who easily won in 18 minutes 43.80 seconds. Jedlicka and Mandeesa Vos of Lynnville-Sully battled for the third and fourth spot with Vos edging her by 3 tenths of a second. Jedlicka posted a personal best of 19:30.70.
Jedlicka was hoping her teammate Ava Huffman would make the field. However, Huffman was about 30 seconds off the pace. She finished 17th overall in 21:15.4.
Jedlicka had a goal to meet in addition to making the state field.
“I wanted to break 20 (minutes) and qualify,” said Jedlicka. “This was an easier course as it was flat. Last year was quite hilly but the weather was much nicer.”
Junior Amber Knockel placed 40th in 24:38 and Alivia Schock was 44th in 24:58.10.
NM coach Roman Meyers has had in interesting debut season. Runners battling injury and other issues the teams have gotten better and many set personal records at Thursday’s meet.
“We have runners peaking at the right time,” said Meyers. “ We added runners all season and we are going to be ready for next year.”
Senior Kincaid Mitchell paced the boys taking 29th in a personal best 19:16.27. Senior Axl Patterson placed 37th in 20:15.97 and Dallas Langman was 40th in 20:45.31. Freshman Jeb Goemaat was 45th in 21:24.52. Another freshman, Cain Grandia had a goal of breaking 23 minutes but just missed his goal by 82 hundreths of a second as he placed 50th in 23:00.82. William Cox placed 59th in 27:43.44.
Jedlicka will work to better her 88th place finish in 2023. She will compete at 10:30 a.m. at Fort Dodge Municipal Golf Course on Saturday, Nov. 2. She will take a day or two before resuming training.
“I think I will just do some training to help get my time down and we will see what state brings,” said Jedlicka.
