Springfield, Illinois – August 2002  Was there a runner within 50 yards of him, ever? Not even close! Michael Enno, 8th grader at Blessed Sacrament School, today showed a field of runners just how easy it is to complete the two-mile course at Washington Park as he ran unchallenged from the start to break the course record. Enno posted 12:49 under a record time of 13:08 put up by Hugh McDermott last year. Enno is just starting his season. His coaches look for him to go well below that time by Sectionals.

 
Enno, like McDermott, is sure to be state bound this year but, Enno won’t likely go alone because Gus Bloink, an outstanding 6th grader from St. Agnes, also broke last year’s course record today posting 13:02. Winning times out of Sectionals last year were 13:00 and below. Can you do it Gus? Your coaches say, “Absolutely.” In fact, the BSS/SAS coaches are fairly confident they will be taking full boys’ and girls’ teams to the state meet this year in Bloomington. “Time” will tell.
 
For the BSS/SAS Boys’ Cross Country team it seemed like anything over 15:00 was just going to be unacceptable. Twenty-two members strong, this boys' team put up times today in the triangular meet against Christ the King and Grant that were unimaginable. Goals set the day before were surpassed by leaps and bounds by every single runner. Fourteen BSS/SAS runners went sub 15 and eight of them were sub 14:30.
 
Trey Dhabalt, 7th grader at BSS, posted 13:06 a full minute under his best from last year. Dhabalt secured an individual 5th place finish. Andy Ralph cruised across the finish line still chewing his gum and put up a time of 13:54 for ninth. Joey White, the boy wonder recruited out of the fifth grade class for dedication to the sport and tremendous effort, ran fifth man on the team today, the same position he held going in to the meet. White posted 14:08 for his first official Cross Country meet of his young life. Running 6th and 7th man next week at Petersburg wiil be Val Contri (14:11) and Mike Witsman(14:15).
 
For the BSS/SAS boys these are the ones to watch for working their way into Sectional Seven position: Tim Capestrain (14:25), Ryan Timoney (14:35), Greg Larson(14:39), Grant Bitzer (14:40), Peter McDermott (14:42), Devin Mapes (14:46), Ben Ahrens (14:53) and Ryan Ciotti (15:00).

“ Ciotto just joined the team three days ago, said Coach Jacki Ralph, “The rest of the team has been running since August 5th. Look for Ciotti to be among the Sectional Seven as soon as we get him in shape.” Ciotti is an 8th grader at SAS.
 
The following runners shaved five full minutes off their personal bests from last week and all of them ran outstanding races today: Zach Jones(15:14), Chris Frank(15:18), Zach Boente(15:41), Colin O’Marro(15:43) and Danny Lord(18:35).
 
SAS/BSS Boys won today’s meet over Grant and then CTK. Final scores should be in today’s State Journal Register. “It is going to be a great year for these kids,” said Coach Ralph. “It is going to be so hard to resign my position over to new coaches Terri Enno and Kelly White while I go coach for SHG. You can bet I will have my cell phone near by every race day and I will be waiting for these same superstars to join my high school team in the very near future.”