There wasn't expected to be much championship drama today, Ravenswood was a very strong favorite in the team race, and Andrew Benford was nearly just as strong a favorite in the individual race. The real race to watch in this division was the race for 2nd individually, with as many as 6 guys having legitimate shots at the spot. In the end, Ravenswood and Andrew Benford did not disppoint, easily winning both the team and individual competitions, and the race for 2nd was indeed fun to watch as each of the top 5 guys finished in a time faster than the Class AAA champion from the morning session.

Shortly after the gun, a pair of Doddridge runners got tangled with Levi Grandt nearly going to the ground. It was a situation that normally would result in a restart, but the official starter did not see the incident and there was no backup starter for the meet. 50 meters in, and one of the candidate for the 2nd spot was in dead last.

At the first checkpoint, at roughly 0.6 miles, Ravenswood's Andrew Benford had already moved to the front, he was followed closely by Oak Glen's Brian Wilson. Also already near the front were Ravenswood's Ben Wise, Winfield's Zac Noel, Doddridge's David Orejuela, and Doddridge's Levi Grandt, who had already managed to blast his way up through the field.

At the mile mark, Andrew Benford had already created a 6 second gap on the field, coming through in a blistering 4:51. Brian Wilson was holding 2nd, coming through in 4:57. Levi Grandt and Ben Wise were running a tight 3rd and 4th crossing at about 5:01. Zac Noel and David Orejuela were running a tight race for 5th and 6th crossing at about 5:03. Scott's Chris McGee was running in 7th. Charleston Catholic's James Sheridan, Webster Skyler McCoy, and Grafton's Brandon Miles were next to cross the marker, holding the last of the top 10 spots at this point. They were followed by the Ravenswood trio of Dusty Mullins, Kurt Gray, and Ben Miller. The next group through included Berkeley Springs' Luke Unger, St. Marys' Jesse Templeton, and Ritchie's Chuck Richards.

At the two-mile mark, Andrew Benford had taken full control of the race, moving out to around a 15 second lead in coming through in 10:01. Ben Wise was in control of 2nd, coming through in about 10:17. Levi Grandt was clinging to a slight lead for 3rd, just ahead of Brian Wilson and Zac Noel, with the first two crossing the marker at 10:20 and Noel at 10:21. David Orejuela was about 5 seconds back, crossing in 10:26. Chris McGee was taking control of 7th at this point. Brandon Miles and Skyler McCoy were in a dead heat battling for 8th. James Sheridan was solidly in 10th. Luke Unger had moved into 11th. He was followed by Tucker's Lucas Warner and Ravenswood's Kurt Gray. They were followed by Jesse Templeton, Jesse Templton, and Tucker's John Lowther.

At the finish, Andrew Benford had further pulled away from the field, stretching to a 33 second victory in an outstanding 15:51. Zac Noel used his patient pace and a strong last mile to take control of 2nd finishing in 16:24. Ben Wise just just able to hold off Levi Grandt and a furious late charge of David Orejuela to keep 3rd by 2 seconds. Orejuela just slipped by Grandt at the line to claim 4th. The first 5 runners were 16:31 or better, each eclipsing the time of the Class AAA winner. Brian Wilson easily held on for 6th in 16:42. Chris McGee also held his spot with ease, crossing in 7th in 16:51, giving Class A-AA 7 runners under 17:00. Brandon Miles pulled slightly away from Skyler McCoy as they took 8th and 9th, respectively. Luke Unger just edged Lucas Warner in a 100 Meter race to decide the final All-State spot.

There was only one place in the team scoring that didn't go as expected, and that's where I'm going to land in my MVP selection for this year. Keyser and Tucker had battled back and forth all year. Keyser had won the regional matchup, but when the predictions came out, Tucker was picked to knock them off. From listening to people talk at the Regional Meet, it became apparent that all either team really wanted was to beat the other. Of course, they all want to finish as high as possible, but if there's one thing either team can accomplish that will make them happy, it's to beat the other team. Keyser managed to edge Tucker by 5 points for 5th place. The main mover that caused that to happen was Ryan Hotchkiss. He had been slotted to place 47th, and came through for his team with a 34th place finish. That moved gained his team 9 points, enough to move past Tucker into 5th place.

So, how did RunWV do on the predictions? Pretty well. The top 4 teams finished just as expected. Keyser swapped places with Tucker, and 7th through 11th finished just as expected. Individually, 9 of the top 10 did indeed gain All-State Honors. 13 of the top 15 finished in the top 15, and 20 of the top 25 finished in the top 25. Probably not the best set of picks ever, but pretty good. The runner who stepped in to take an All-State position that wasn't picked to do so was Berkeley Springs' Luke Unger (picked 11th, got 10th). The runners who joined the top 25 that weren't predicted to be there were PikeView's Brent Roark (picked 48th, got 18th), Pendleton's Andrew Graves (picked 36th, got 21st), Weir's Ronald Reid (picked 26th, got 23rd), Ritchie's Kyle Harris (picked 39th, got 24th), and Independence's Josh Roles (picked 35th, got 25th). The big mover for the day, in case you couldn't already tell was PikeView's Brent Roark. He climbed a massive 30 places from a predicted finish of 48th to an actual finish of 18th, which made him the # 2 Freshman in the race.

We offer our congratulations to the Ravenswood boys. The dynasty continues. You've now set a record for number of Titles ever in the State, and to top it off, you've done it consecutively, and right now no one else is even close. You've responded well to being the team with the target's on your back.

We offer our congratulations to Andrew Benford. You were dominant all season long. You basically dissolved anyone else's hopes of knocking you off the top spot with your performance at the Chick-Fil-A Invitational. You broke the course record on the challenging Doddridge course by 57 seconds. You won the LKC, which was home to 4 of the top 5 finishers at the State Meet, by over 20 seconds. You have continued to conduct yourself with class and respectfulness to your team, your opponents, your coaches, and to the sport.

We offer our congratulations to the boys who shook up our predictions. You prove what we try to tell people every year. Rankings and predictions mean very little in the grand scheme of things. Nothing is determined until the race is run.