Aubrey Cordova forgot to set her watch at the start of the race. Instead, she only had the pace of a state champion in front to guide her through.
McCurdy’s Cordova finished second at the 2022 Sundevil Invitational cross country meet on Aug. 25, behind only Raylee Hunt from St. Michael’s, the reigning 3A state champion (Cordova was close through the first two laps before Hunt fully pulled away at the end). On a hot day in a difficult three-lap course in Española, the Horsemen were the winners but other local athletes shined in their first race of the fall.
Cordova finished sixth at the 2A state championship in November 2021 as a freshman after running a career-best 21:28. This year, she hopes to run under 20 minutes.
Cordova said she was expecting to finish seventh or eighth in the race beforehand. But Peñasco did not end up coming to the race with their talented squad, increasing the McCurdy runner’s chances.
“I was hurting,” Cordova said. “But I was feeling really good. That hill really killed me though.”
Cordova was followed by Española’s Hailey Renteria in third place and freshman Nevea Lovato in fourth.
“I didn’t know what I was expecting,” Renteria said. “I was nervous. But I got through it.”
Renteria is following up on a 32nd-place finish at 22:03 for the 4A state championships as the only Sundevil who qualified. Now, the sophomore has a new running partner who can match her speed.
“It was nice for me to not slow down, and just keep doing the pace I was doing,” Renteria said.
“That’s what I try to teach them, is learning how to run together,” said Española coach Daniel Velasquez. “Because when it comes down to it, each point counts.”
Allison Cantrell from McCurdy took 10th place in the girls race.
For the boys race, St. Michael’s had the top three finishers.
Española Valley junior Daniel Sanchez was the race’s favorite as he comes off a breakout season in 2021 that ended with eighth place at the state championships. Among non-seniors from that race, Sanchez was third, and just a half-second behind Derick Castellanos from Lovington. Though Hope Christian’s Rendon Kuykendall seems unstoppable in first place as the Gatorade Athlete of the Year.
But Sanchez, after leading the first lap of the race, pulled off after twisting his ankle on the track.
“At this point, early in the season, I don’t want to chance it,” Velasquez said. He said they were waiting to see how he felt over the week, but Sanchez should be fine by next week when Española runs at the Academy for Technology and the Classics Invitational in Santa Fe.
Mesa Vista’s eighth-grader Ezequiel Nevarez had an impressive start to his high-school career, finishing fourth place behind the Horsemen runners. The Trojans also had Jordan Cervantes in eighth and Kenny Gallegos in ninth.