Arcadia Invitational - April 5 & 6
Arcadia High School - Arcadia, CA
Friday and Saturday will see some of the top track athletes in the US compete at the prestigious Arcadia Invitational. The following are some of the top west coast athletes who will compete this weekend.
Friday
The highlights for Friday evening will be the early heats of the 3200 and the 4 X 800 and 4 X 1600 relays. In the girls 4 X 800, defending champion Del Norte of San Diego is entered as well as JSerra, Ventura and Cathedral Catholic. Buchanan boys are the defending 4 X 800 and they are entered again this year. Great Oak, San Clemente and Carmichael Jesuit are other contenders. Buchanan girls return to try to win the girl's 4 X 1600. Jesuit of Oregon, Oaks Christian and Lost Altos CC are other strong contenders. Jesuit of Oregon has run well at the boy's 4 X 1600 in the past and are entered once again. Dana Hills, Issaquah and ML King will try to challenge defending champion American Fork.
Saturday
West coast athletes to watch in the girl's invitational 800 include Georgia Jeanneret of JSerra and Arielle McKenzie of Calabasas who recently finished 1-2 at the Ten. Other candidates to challenge favorite Allison Ince of Normal Community are Tessa Buswell of Poway and L'Mio Edwards of Claremont. Xai Ricks of Long Beach Poly and Andreas Dybdahl of Santa Barbara are the west coast athletes to watch in the boy's invitational 800.
Sadie Engelhardt of Ventura is going to try to win the invitational mile at Arcadia for the third time. Based on her 4:09.70 time in the 1500 meters at The Ten by Sound Running, she may be looking to break the national mile record of 4:33.87 set by Katelyn Touhy of North Rockland in 2018. Other west coast athletes racing in the invitational mile include Payton Godsey of Oaks Christian, Ashlyn Boothby of Scotts Valley, Chloe Huyler of Lakeridge, Ana Peters of Lake Oswego and Rebecca O'Keefe of Skyline. West coast athletes hoping to win the boy's invitational mile include Connor Bennett of Loyola, who finished second at The Ten by Sound Running, Alden Morales of JSerra, Carter Spradling of Clovis East, Maximo Zavaleta of ML King and Aydon Stefanopoulos of Los Gatos.
One of the showcase events at the Arcadia Invitational is the invitational 3200 meters as girls try to break ten minutes and boys look to break the nine minute barrier. Some of the notable west coast athletes racing in the girl's invitational 3200 include Payton Godsey of Oaks Christian (Godsey is also listed in the invitational mile), Rylee Blade of Santiago of Corona who won the California 3200-meter state title last June, Sophia Rodriguez of Mercer Island who won Washington's 3A cross country state title, Emily Wisniewski of Crescent Valley who has won numerous Oregon 5A cross country and track titles, Holly Barker of Trabuco Hills, a NXN qualifier last fall and Anna Callahan of Skyline, who has won multiple Washington 4A cross country and track titles. Gioana Lopizzo of La Costa Canyon, Jaelyn Williams of Eastlake and Chiara Dailey of La Jolla are other top west coast athletes competing Saturday night.
The boy's 3200 has most of the top runners in the nation lining up on Saturday night. There are number of west coast athletes who plan to mix it up with country's best athletes. Trayvon Kitchen of Crater won the Oregon 5A cross country and teammate Josiah Tostenson ran an outstanding indoor season. Jason Parra of Millikan is the California division 1 cross country champion, Evan Noonan of Dana Hills won the division 3 California cross country championship, Owen Powell of Mercer Island won Washington's 3A cross country championship and Emmanuel Perez of Cathedral won the division 4 California State Meet. Anthony Fast Horse of Ventura, Izban Felix of Beckman, Grant Morgenfeld of Palo Alto and Joshua Bell of Templeton will also be competing Saturday night.
The popular Arcadia Invitational Distance Medley Relay will be competed before and after the invitational 3200-meters race. Since many of the top athletes will be competing in the 3200 meters, they may not be joining their teammates in the DMR. JSerra, Buchanan, Cathedral Catholic and Santiago of Corona are some of the top girl's teams in the DMR. San Clemente, Great Oak, Ventura and Dana Hills are some of the west coast schools that are competing in the boy's DMR.
Look for photo galleries of the Arcadia Invitational!