The day started off with one of the more anticipated team and individual races. The individual event was expected to be a duel between Denny Hayes and Justin Simpson. The team event was expected to come down to the wire between Ravenswood and Doddridge. The event did not disappoint. The gun fired, and they were off. At the bottom of the main hill, Doddridge's Denny Hayes had grabbed a small lead. Ravenswood's Isaac Andrick, Oak Glen's Justin Simpson, and Doddridge's Josh Sheets were just behind. The front pack really had not separated themselves much from the main pack, meaning that no conclusions could be drawn yet. The next checkpoint came at roughly the 1.9 mile mark. By this time, three people had made a breakaway from the field. Hayes still held the lead with Simpson and Sheets not far behind. Andrick had held onto the fourth spot, and Grafton's Jon Riffle had climbed into fifth. The leaders came out of the woods and across the water extremely close together. It was still anyone's race. As they rounded the ball fields and climbed the last rise, Hayes saw his opening. He used a resounding surge down the grade, around the caboose and through the finishing chute to gather in a 6 second victory over the previously unbeaten (in AA competition) Simpson. Simpson narrowly held off Sheets for second place by a half second. Andrick maintained the fourth spot, and Riffle kept his fifth place spot. Sy Farris of Frankfort used an excellent last mile to climb from the 12th position into the 6th finishing slot. Kevin Williams of Weir grabbed 7th place. Ritchie's Cole Carpenter held onto the 8th spot. Gilmer freshman Nick Dent snagged 9th place, and Liberty Raleigh's Chris Herron rounded out the All-State team with his 10th place finish. In the team event, Ravenswood used solid performances from its front five to take home a seven point victory over Doddridge. No one in their front five had a significant drop off from their expected performance, and that consistency resulted in a State Championship. Ravenswood's win broke Doddridge's stronghold on the event (they had won 6 of the past 7 years). Doddridge's runner-up spot is the 9th consecutive year in the top 2. RunWV's MVP for the 2000 A-AA Boys State Championship is Jon Riffle. Riffle's amazing run into fifth place was 14 places higher than he was picked, and more importantly, he gained seven team places, which plays a large role in leading Grafton to a third place finish over Weir. Other people may have moved up more spots, but no one did it in such a difficult area...the top of the field. Congratulations to Denny Hayes, the Ravenswood team, and Jon Riffle.

So how did RunWV do in our predictions? We knew going in that the race between Simpson and Hayes would be tight, and we weren't disappointed. We had picked Simpson, but Hayes took him out. 8 of our predicted top 10 finished in the top 10, 12 of our top 15 finished in the top 15, and 20 of our top 25 finished in the top 25. Congratulations go out to Jon Riffle and Kevin Williams for unexpectedly getting into the top 10. Congratulations to Jon Riffle (again), Adam Raper, and Scott Gemberling for squeezing into the top 15. And congratulations to Nate Koehnen, Josh Simpson, Marc Moshier, Casey Workman, and Charlie Bergen for climbing into the top 25. The biggest mover of the day was Brent Wellings, who finished 33rd after being slated for a 52nd place finish. On the team end of things, we did correctly pick the team champion and runner-up. Our third and fourth places were reversed. Oak Glen, Frankfort, and PikeView were in the right order, but each placed one spot higher than expected.