The Reeths-Puffer girls cross country team has been working to find its footing against some really tough competition, but junior Jersi Bilek seems to be in midseason form.
The Rockets’ top runner had two very strong finishes over the past week, both in conference and non-conference action.
Bilek, a junior, took fifth place out of 127 runners in the individual standings last week at the first O-K Green conference meet of the season, finishing in 20:33.
“Jersi ran a fantastic race by keeping with the lead pack the entire race,” said R-P Coach Lindsay Keefe.
Jersi Bilek
Bilek followed that on Saturday by finishing 11th out of 129 runners individually at the Holland West Ottawa Bredeweg Invitational, posting a season-best time of 19:50.
“There were two really fast packs out there leading, and Bilek stuck herself in the middle and held her ground,” Keefe said.
The Rockets finished fourth out of five teams in the conference meet with 107 points, outdistancing Mona Shores, which had 137.
Jenison won the event with 25 points.
Kaitlyn Durow
R-P’s Kaitlyn Durow finished 29th with a time of 23:10, Gabrielle Chevez was 37th with a time of 23:45. Adrienne Fluette took 40th with a mark of 24:02 and Darcy Keefe was 52nd at 24:30.
R-P finished seventh out of 14 teams at West Ottawa on Saturday with 210 points. West Ottawa ran away with first place with 20 points.
Chevez finished 34th (21:12), Durow was 67th (22:31), Fluette finished 75th (22:52) and Chari Belinger took 96th (24:10).
“The ladies had set some reasonable goals for the week, and we put in a ton of pace work and it paid off,” Coach Keefe said.