By Sherri Smith

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MANCHESTER - The Newtown High boys cross country team put an end to the 1999 season with a 13th place finish at the CIAC Class L championship meet held last week at Wickham Park in Manchester. [/naviga:h2]

The boys finished the regular season 14-1 and went on to claim a third-place finish at the South-West Conference championship.

The runners competed in the Wickham Invitational earlier this season and went into this race with a familiarity of the course. Two varsity runners, Joe Blanchard and Ryan Walker did not compete in the class championships. Alternates on the varsity team, AJ Palmer and Micah Uhrlass stepped in.

“The kids ran pretty well,” said head coach Rich Pesce. “Everyone improved considerably from the first run at Wickham this year. Stu Ratcliff knocked one minute and two seconds off his time.”

Chris Carolan was the lone tri-captain leading the varsity runners, tri-captains Glenn Stiewing out at the start of the season and Blanchard injured during the SWC’s. Carolan and Jeff Heller, two front runners all season, led the Nighthawks. Heller placed 35th overall in the race with a time of 17:38 and Carolan ran 40th in 17:42. Teammate David Rod ran 86th overall with a time of 18:52. This was the first time run of the season for Rod on the Wickham course.

Ryan Ignatius ran 93rd overall with a time of 19:01 with teammate Stu Ratcliff right behind in 98th position with a time of 19:10. Micah Uhrlass ran 101st in 19:14 and Palmer followed 102nd in 19:17.

The top five scores are added together to reach the combined score of 352 points, placing Newtown 13th in the division. To qualify for the State Open, the top two teams of each division earn an automatic berth, then eight teams are chosen by combined times. After the teams are chosen, the top 30 individuals earn the right to run.

Newtown runners did not qualify in either case.

“Not having Ryan and Joe healthy to run hurt us a bit,” said Pesce. “Joe would have been up front and as a team there was a really good chance they may have qualified.”

Starting the season without their tri-captain and number one runner, Newtown runners should have absorbed a lot of positive things from this season.