Reeths-Puffer cross country runners Jersi Bilek and Gabrielle Chevez have won their share of medals over the past two seasons, and they each added one more on Saturday with top 10 performances at the Cougar Falcon Invitational at Calvin College.
Bilek, a junior and R-P’s top runner, finished fourth individually out of 183 runners with a time of 19:36. Chevez, a sophomore who consistently finishes second on the team, took sixth place in the race with a time of 20:34.
Jersi Bilek
Bilek and Chevez helped the R-P girls finish in fifth place out of eight teams with 99 points. That was 44 points better than rival Mona Shores, which finished sixth.
“Jersi Bilek had an outstanding race,” said R-P Coach Lindsay Keefe. “She always rises to the occasion, so when we arrived at this newly-routed course for the first time, with its huge dirt uphill and the temperatures increasing, Bilek was like ‘Yeah, yeah, we got it!’ and ran her season record of 19:36!
Gabrielle Chevez
“Gabrielle showed up ready to run, dropping 10 seconds from her race last week.”
R-P's Kaitlyn Durow finished 25th overall with a time of 22:44. Adrienne Fluette was 34th with a time of 23:57 and Darcy Keefe took 37th place with a mark of 24:26.