San Diego Mesa women, Hartnell men capture wins at Pink in the Park Invitational

 

SALINAS - Formerly known as the Toro Park Invitational, this year's edition was renamed Pink in the Park. giving participating teams an opportunity to show their support for Breast Cancer Awareness for the month of October. Seventeen colleges descended on Toro Park in Salinas for this annual October race over the challenging course. Three state-ranked women's teams in #3 San Diego Mesa College, #5 Hartnell College and #6 Clovis Community College duked it out over three miles with a surprising outcome when the dust settled. In the men's race, #3 Clovis Community College, #4 San Diego Mesa College, and #5 host Hartnell College would see the host team surprise both with the home course proving to be beneficial to the Hartnell squad.

In the women's 3-mile, an early pack of six runners broke away and by halfway had asserted themselves. College of San Mateo Runner's of the Week Ericka Dorn and Deia Kerseg-Foreman, along with San Diego Mesa College pair Jazzlyn Islas and Natalie Allen packed up and set a solid pace over the first 1.5 mile loop. Another Runner of the Week recipient in recent Central Park Classic runner-up Siena Pignataro of De Anza College quietly sat in the back of the pack with host school freshman Gabriela Cardenas of Hartnell proving she could handle the pace as the group headed into the hills. The team race heading into the hills showed Hartnell College leading with 41 points with San Diego Mesa College running conservatively in second at 65 points. Clovis was third with 71 and a surprising De Anza squad just two points back. CSM's Dorn and Mesa's freshman Islas emerged first from the hills neck-and-neck with just over 1000 meters to go. Allen was the next closest, trailing by just two seconds, with Coast Conference runners Pignataro and Cardenas giving a potential preview of the conference championship race on this course, just four seconds apart. The team scores showed Mesa just one point behind Hartnell College, 54 to 55, and potentially in danger of the upset. De Anza had managed to move ahead of Clovis with less than a mile of running left. In a sprint finish, Dorn would take the victory in a swift 18:23 and Islas in 18:26. They moved into the #8 and #9 all-time spots for Toro Park. Allen (18:40), Pignataro (18:46) and Cardenas (18:58) would all break the 19-minute barrier and put up all-time top 20 marks. San Diego Mesa would use a late charge over the final loop to distance themselves by six points, 53 to 59, over host Hartnell College. De Anza won a tiebreaker with Clovis in the matchup of each team's first five scorers, 3-2, on the strength of their first three runners across the line. 

 

The individual battle in the men's 4-mile saw four of the best runners in the state in Cuesta's Weston Greenelsh, San Diego Mesa's Luciano Roberts, Butte's Stephan Chapdelaine, and host Hartnell's Julian Vargas. Pink in the Park would be the first time all four would face off this fall and the race did not disappoint. Chapdelaine set off early in hopes of breaking the course record of 20:09 set by Oscar Uribe of Butte College. Vargas chose to match strides to the 1.6-mile mark. Greenelsh, last year's 3C2A State Champion, sat five seconds off the pace with Roberts, the State Preview top community college finisher, one second behind him. The team race heading into the hills had Hartnell asserting itself with 49 points followed by Clovis at 59. Butte's 114 and San Diego Mesa's 117 nearly doubled the score of the top two teams with just over half the race distance left to run. When the runners re-emerged from the hill loop at 2.4 miles, Chapdelaine was now challenged by Roberts. Vargas and Greenelsh were just two seconds back and running together. The foursome would traverse the 1.5-mile loop one more time before the finish. After the hills, Hartnell held steady in the lead with 48 points but the gap from Clovis to San Diego Mesa shrank dramatically with the Crush seeing its points total rise to 63 but SD Mesa dropped to 93. Butte College gained some ground in the hills at 109. With 300 meters to go, Greenelsh and Roberts were in full flight and would remain so through near identical 20:21.0 and 20:21.4 finishing times. Chapdelaine did not break the record but shaved four seconds off his winning time from 2024 in 20:28. Vargas held on for fourth in 20:48, the last runner under 21:00. Greenelsh and Roberts move into the fourth and fifth best marks ever with Chapdelaine moving to fourteenth. Hartnell College would surprise the field with a winning score of 57 points powered by their second through seventh runners all finishing within 30 seconds. Clovis would tally 71 to edge out San Diego Mesa at 76 points. Butte College was fourth with 107 points.