Through harsh conditions this weekend, we still had some fast times come out of this weekend. The main event of the past weekend was the St. Joseph's Invitational with a showing of most of the top teams in the state.
Lily Garrett finishing 1st at the St. Joseph's Invite
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Both individual titles were snagged by Lily Garrett and Caleb Babineaux of Ruston. Garrett has had a perfect run of the season so far with new personal bests and an undefeated season. Right now, she looks like the best runner in the state. She won the meet in a time of 18:33 which is the second-fastest performance in the state, even in harsh conditions.
Caleb Babineaux (left) and Jake Tournillon (right)
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Babineaux has nearly remained undefeated so far. He has only lost to three other runners this season, all of whom he beat this past weekend. It could be due to the conditions, but either way, Caleb Babineaux is easily one of the top dogs in Louisiana. He won his division in a time of 15:56.
Other competitors on the boys' side that fared well were Jake Tournillon of Christ Episcopal School and John Walker McDonald of Dunham. These two duked it out, behind Babineaux, in the muddy conditions, and all finished with a separation of three seconds between each of them.
For the girls' side, following Garrett was Ava Hartman of Newman and Morgan Trauth of Dominican. Despite the conditions, the two sophomores also broke 19-minutes for this race and concluded their day with times of 18:49 and 18:53, respectively.
In regards to the team score, St. Joseph's Academy was threatened by Ruston's girl team with a gap of only 12 points between them. This is the closest that any team has come to them all season and it could give them some worry when it comes down to the state meet.
For the boys, Catholic High finished on top with a final team score of 78 points, with Ruston following behind in second place with 107 points. This was a turn of events since the last time that these two met head-to-head, Ruston took the lead with a 42 point difference.
These were overall very muddy conditions so it was interesting to see that some quality times came out of this race this weekend.
Make sure to check out other content from this meet: