Mora Caps Career with D2 Title
November 3, 2012
By Bill Khan
Special to Second Half
BROOKLYN — When it was time to make a move, Connor Mora had no idea how it would play out.
All he knew was he wanted to finish his last high school cross country race with no regrets.
The Cedar Springs senior passed Mason’s Tanner Hinkle with three-quarters of a mile to go and kept surging toward the finish line, winning the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 2 championship with a time of 15:04.2 on Saturday at Michigan International Speedway.
Hinkle, who ran a stride ahead of Mora most of the race, finished second in 15:09.8.
“He’s a great competitor,” Mora said of Hinkle. “There wasn’t a point where I felt I had him until I finished the race. I guess I gave it all I had. If he had a better day than me, then that’s what it was, but I gave it all I can.”
Hinkle set a fast early pace, reaching the mile in 4:48. Mora was content to let Hinkle do the work for at least the first two miles.
“I went in ready to adjust my strategy with whatever the race threw at me,” Mora said. “When Hinkle took it out hard, I decided to just sit back and wait until the two mile to see where he would take it. He had me up until the two mile. That’s the point where I felt confident enough to go to the finish.”
Mora didn’t feel he performed well in past MHSAA Finals, though four top-15 finishes is a rare accomplishment in the larger-school divisions. He was 15th in 2009 (16:23.4), fifth in 2010 (15:39.0) and third in 2011 (15:33.2). Hinkle was one place behind him last year in 15:41.3.
Mora’s time was the fastest of the day in all four divisions. Erie Mason’s Nick Raymond won Division 3 in 15:05.1, while Milford’s Brian Kettle won Division 1 in 15:07.3.
“I haven’t always had great state meets these past years,” Mora said. “I guess I just usually have an average race.”
St. Clair edged Linden by a 114-128 margin for the team championship. Linden had three all-state runners (top 30 overall), but St. Clair had its five scoring runners in the top 47, while Linden’s fifth runner didn’t cross until 93rd place.
It was the first team title for the Saints, who had six top-10 finishes in the previous 12 years.
Senior Brennan Shafer led St. Clair, placing seventh among team runners in 15:39.6. Junior Cody Smith was 10th in 15:51.4, junior Trevor Holowaty 28th in 16:09.3, senior Dakota Hazel 34th in 16:17.9 and senior Andrew Snider 35th in 16:18.6.
PHOTO: Mason's Tanner Hinkle (right) and Cedar Springs' Connor Mora ran together most of the Division 2 Final before Mora pushed ahead for his first championship. (Click to see more from RunMichigan.com.)
Raymond's Race to Remember
November 12, 2012
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Over the past nine days, Nick Raymond has replayed his best high school cross country race over and over in his memory.
He starts from the beginning and goes right through the finish line – while enjoying especially his surge during the second of the 3.1-mile Lower Peninsula Division 3 Final on Nov. 3 at Michigan International Speedway.
“If I hadn't done that, it could’ve been a difference race,” Raymond admitted Monday.
Instead, it was one of the best Division 3 races run in MHSAA history.
The Erie Mason senior received a Second Half High 5 after claiming his school’s first overall individual championship in 15:05.1, the second-fastest Division 3/Class C Finals time behind only that of Ovid-Elsie’s Maverick Darling in 2007. Raymond's also was the second-fastest time run at the Finals this fall.
And it was a redeeming way to finish his high school cross country career. Raymond found himself at the front of the Division 3 pack as a junior in 2011, but finished fourth. But he started this race with a speedy 4:39 mile and then kicked into another gear halfway home, which was his strategy all along.
“I've just been doing that all year, and it seemed to be working time-wise,” Raymond said. “If I do it then, and I can pull away, it gets into (my opponents') minds that they could get beat.”
Erie Mason has a solid running tradition. It finished 16th as a team this fall and won Division 3 in 2006. Matthew Waldfogel took first among individual finishers in the 1994 Class C Final, when team and individual qualifiers ran separate races, although his time would've tied for only second if both had been run together.
Raymond’s final season puts him at the top of individuals who have come through the program.
He finished his freshman year as the team’s number two runner, and “just progressively got faster,” Erie Mason coach Alison Meisner said. By the end of last fall, Raymond had the school record with a best of 15:59, his time at MIS.
But the best was yet to come.
"He had lots of natural talent, but he has a really good worth ethic," Meisner said. "He's very goal-oriented. He's just a little more driven to work at goals he sets for himself."
When he opened this season at the Ottawa Lake Whiteford Invitational by running 15:59 again, Meisner knew her standout might show more than just the usual improvement that comes from going from junior to senior.
Raymond’s moment of realization came two weeks later when he ran a 15:26 at the New Boston Huron Invitational.
“I realized I could go much faster,” he said. “I was pretty tired, because it was the first time I ever went that fast. But whenever I get a p.r. (personal record), I feel like I could go faster.”
Raymond ran 15:16 a week later at the Oregon Cardinal Stritch Invitational near Toledo, and then 15:15 or better three times before cutting 10 more seconds at MIS.
Oddly enough, the subject of Darling – now a standout at the University of Wisconsin – came up after Raymond beat the field by more than a minute with a 15:15 at his Regional.
An opposing runner quipped that Raymond might have dominated, but he wasn't Darling just yet.
But he’s getting closer. And Raymond too hopes to continue running at the highest level next fall.
“They were dogging me that I wasn't as good as Maverick Darling was,” Raymond said. “But my friends said it was sweet that I was even mentioned in the same sentence as him.”
PHOTO: Erie Mason senior Nick Raymond charges down the home stretch on the way to winning the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 3 championship at Michigan International Speedway. (Click to see more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)