The Olympian Eagles may have come closest among all Metro Conference teams competing at last Friday’s 42nd annual South Bay Invitational at Rohr Park to snatching a team title when they posted a runner-up finish in the opening boys frosh/soph race. Point Loma emerged with the division title with 73 points but Olympian was right behind with 78 points.
The Eagles held a 20-point edge on third place Santana.
Olympian sophomore Nicholas Albro held the lead for a good portion of the 257-deep race before Julian sophomore Ethan Elisara broke free in the last mile to win by 11 seconds. Elisara timed 17:23 on the 5K course; Albro timed 17:34.
Both front-runners finished well ahead of Monte Vista freshman Damien De La Cruz, who finished third in 18:09.
“It felt good the first two miles,”Albro explained. “On the last mile, it was hard. The guy took off. I was five meters behind him. I couldn’t catch him. The race itself was long but it was really fast. It was fun.”
Olympian placed all five of its scorers in the top nine percent of the field. Sophomore Julio Navarro placed 16th in 19:34, followed by sophomore Tristan Villanueva (18th, 19:44), sophomore Oswald Seri (20th, 19:45) and freshman Eric Simmons (22nd, 19:48).
Otay Ranch placed fifth among the 21 scoring teams with 190 points, followed by Bonita Vista (seventh, 248 points), High Tech Chula Vista (12th, 314 points) and Chula Vista (16th, 402 points).
