Riverside WA Senior Jamar Distel Outruns Boys Field As Nike Portland XC Roars Back To Life

By Doug Binder, DyeStat Editor

A West coast matchup between two of the top three girls teams in the U.S. and a handul of top individuals made Nike Portland XC one of the most significant meets in the country so far in the high school cross country season. 

With the announcement that Nike Cross Nationals will not be happening in 2021, No. 2 Cherry Creek of Colorado used superior depth at the Nos. 5 and 6 spots to beat No. 3 Summit of Oregon 69-82 in a meeting between top-ranked teams from the Southwest and Northwest regions. 

WEBCAST REPLAY | RACE VIDEOS | PHOTOS by Kim Spir | RESULTS

And at the front of an elite Jim Danner Championship race at Blue Lake Park, junior Kate Peters from Lake Oswego pulled away from two-time Colorado 5A champion Riley Stewart over the final 1,000 meters to reach the finsh line in 16:40.9 for a 5-kilometer course record. Stewart was next in 16:43.7 and Mira Costa CA's Dalia Frias, the Woodbridge Cross County Classic record-breaker, was third in 17:14.0. 

Cherry Creek, which returned to Nike Portland XC for the first time since Stewart's freshman year in 2018, got the victory thanks to fifth runner Paisley Piepgras (21st), sixth runner Claire Semerod (24th) and seventh runner Baylor Wolfe (35th) all finishing ahead of Summit's fifth, Payton Finney (43rd).  

Frias led Mira Costa to third place with 83 points. 

A warm day in Portland, where temperatures rose to the mid 80s, greeted big-meet cross country back to area after being absent in 2020. Nearly 2,300 high school runners competed across 18 races at the meet hosted by Aloha High of Beaverton. 

The day's biggest surprise came in the boys race where Jamar Distel of Riverside High, a Class 1A school with fewer than 500 students, won the championship race in 14:47.8. Last April, Distel won the Washington Coaches Association State Championship Virtual Meet with a time of 15:12. In May he ran 4:12.47 for 1,600 meters at the Tacoma High Performance meet. 

Distel out ran Sherwood duo Jeffery Rogers (14:59.1) and James Crabtree (15:01.5) for the win. 

Mira Costa won the boys team title, linking together five scorers between 14th and 49th place, for 96 points. Sunset OR was second with 131 points and Sheldon OR was third with 157.