2016
Comstock Cross Country
Coach Peter Livingston-McNelis
BCS Champions
Front Row - Casey Nolan, Coach Pete Livingstone-McNelis, Jaylen Neighbors,
Garrett Green, Seth Ansel, Mubark Hasan, Mateo Oleas,Rodrigo Juarez, Leo Juarez
& Dagan Poe
Back Row - Zach Perkins, Dino Sivley, Sage DeCamp, Vincent McNelis,
Johannes Kraemer, Michael Rooney, Ryusuke Asami, Brad McIntrye
Not Pictured - Johnny Warren
11-5 - MHSAA State Finals
Approximately, a third of the boy's team came to watch Mubark Hasan compete
at the State Championship held at the Michigan International Speedway in
Brooklyn. Mubark was able to compete at the State Championship based on his
outstanding performance at the Regional Meet whereby he took 13th place and
thereby received All-Region Honors. In this race, Mubark wound up capping his
highly successful high school cross country career by setting a new personal
best time of 17:38 and placing 100th in a field of 242 of the best Division III
runners in the State. The hope is that returning runners such as Seth Ansel and
Rodrigo Juarez who came to watch Mubark run this year will next year not only
compete at the State Championship themselves but will make it possible for the
entire boy's team to qualify for the State Championships. We were ooh so very
close this year, let's make it happen next year!!! Go Colts!!!
10-29 - MHSAA Regional
The boy's team entered the Regional Meet with high hopes of qualifying for the
State Championships being ranked 3rd going into the meet with the top 3 team
advancing to the State meet. However, the boy's team instead finished
disappointedly in 6th place out of 14 teams but only 19 points out of 3rd.
Nonetheless, Mubark Hasan probably had his best race of the year finishing in
13th place (18:04) and making the All-Region Team. As a result of his
performance, he will individually qualify for the State Championship. Finishing
in 2nd for the team was Casey Nolan in 26th place (19:01) followed by Vincent
McNelis in 34th place (19:13) who also had an outstanding race running 11 pts.
better than his projected finish, then Seth Ansel in 39th (19:23), and Ryusuki
Asami in 43rd (19:38). Sadly, Rodrigo Juarez who was running well most of the
race was forced to drop out of the race after he collapsed. This meant that the
team finished with only six runners after Johannes Kraemer crossed the line in
76 place (21:15). There is, however, a lot of optimism regarding next year's
team despite losing Mubark, Casey, Vincent, Ryusuki, and Johannes next year
because of the fact that Seth and Rodrigo will be returning and their a host of
talented runners such Jaylen Neighbors, Sage DeCamp, Leo Juarez, and Johnny
Warren among others who with another year of training should be able to mount a
challenge for another BCS title,and perhaps, be good enough to advance to the
State Championship.
10-21 - Gobles Invitational Champions
The boy's team without two of their top 3 runners still won the Goble's
Invitational against 13 schools by placing four runners in the top 15 out of
field of 84 runners. Leading the field was Casey Nolan who finished 2nd overall
(18:00 P.R.), followed in quick succession by Ryusuki Kesami in 13th place
(18:45), then Rodrigo Juarez in 14th place (18:45) and Vincent McNelis in 15th
place (18:51). Rounding out the Top 7 were Jaylen Neighbors in 34th place
(19:50). Johannes Kraemer in 43rd place (20:15), and Johnny Warren in 56th place
(21:01 P.R.). The top 5 runners on the team all medalled and four of the Top 7
runners missed their P.R.'s by a total of 22 seconds on a very tough course. The
team seems to peaking just ahead of the Regional Championship where this team is
attempting to be the 1st team since 1989 to qualify for the State Championship.
10-11 - BCS Meet at Brandywine
The boy's cross country team won their 1st League Championship since 1988 after
winning all three League Championship Meets and winning the final League
Jamboree by dominating the field. In so doing, the boy's team placed five
runners in the Top 15 with Mubark Hasan making 1st Team All-Conference by
placing 7th (18:15) followed in quick succession by Seth Ansel in 8th place
(18:28), Casey Nolan in 9th place (18:36), Vincent McNelis in 12th place
(18:48), and Rodrigo Juarez in 15th place in (18:58). Seth, Casey, and Vincent
all made All-Conference Honorable Mention based on their finishes in this race.
The boy's team entered this race with several runners nursing injuries including
Mubark, Seth, and Rodrigo, yet all three rose to the occasion in a dramatic way,
on top of Vincent having arguably his best race of his career. Other notable
performances were turned in by Sage DeCamp who ran 8th for the team in 20:41
(tying his P.R.) and Johnny Warren who finished 11th for the team while lowering
his P.R. to 21:08.
10-8 - Allegan Invitational
The boy's team had one of its best races with 8 out of the 18 runners races
achieving P.R.'s, including Seth Ansel who rebounded after last week's subpar
performance at Otsego with 8 second P.R. (18:00) and 21st place finish against
largely Division I & II schools in the Varsity I race made up of the Top 3
runners from twenty-one schools entered. Finishing 30 seconds back was Casey
Nolan who finished in 36th place just six places out of earning of medal.
Running with the 3rd fastest time for the team was Vincent McNelis who finished
19th in the Varsity II race made up of the fourth thru 7th fastest runners for
each of the teams. His time of 18:53 was just 7 seconds off his P.R. and was
good enough to earn him a medal in this race. Fourth for the Team was Mubark in
19:08 followed closely by Rodrigo Juarez in 19:26 and Johannes Kraemer in 19:38
P.R. and Ryusuke in 20:09 to round out the Top 7. Stellar performances were also
turned in by Leo Juarez in 20:54 (P.R. by almost a minute), Johnny Warren 21:40
(P.R.), Mateo Oleas (22:34 P.R.), and Dagan Poe (22:39 P.R. by almost a minute).
The boy's team took fourth out of 12 teams losing to #7 Division II Ranked
Otsego, #12 Ranked Division III Grand Rapids Christian Covenant, and losing to
Division II ranked Allegan while edging out Division II Paw Paw which took
fifth. In short, a very competitive field and a great tuneup for next Tuesday
third and final BCS Championship Meet.
10-1 - Otsego Invitational
The boy's team finished 3rd out 11 teams in the Varsity race losing to Bangor
the 23rd Ranked Division III team and being edged out by 6 pts. to Bronson which
finished 2nd to Comstock just a few days ago in the 2nd Jamboree. The close loss
to Bronson was even with Seth Ansel who is always runs in the Top 3 for the team
feeling sick and running 6th for the team some 3 minutes slower than normal. A
major reason for the team still doing well was that the team had three runner in
the Top 15 in the race out of field of 80 with Casey Nolan, despite running on
an injured foot, taking 7th overall in the race (18:07), followed closely behind
by Mubark Hasan in 12th (18:25), and Ryusuki Asami in 15th (18:32 PR). Medals
were awarded to the 25 runners. Rounding out the Top 5 for the varsity team were
Vincent McNelis in 30th (18:57) and Rodrigo Juarez in 39th (19:12).
In the boy's J.V. race, Comstock fielded one of the largest teams and
finished 2nd out of the 5 teams entered. This was done based on the front
running of Jayleen Neighbors (20:25), Garrett Green (20:26), and Sage DeCamp
(20:41 PR) who finished 6th, 7th, and 9th out of field of 39 runners with all
three earning medals in the race. Top 10 runners in the race earned medals.
9-27 - BCS Meet at Mendon
The boy's team made a statement yesterday at the 2nd BCS Jamboree by having
their Top 5 runners finish in the top 20 and six runners finish under 19 minutes
enroute to winning the 2nd Jamboree. With this win the boy's team after having
won the 1st League Jamboree as well is the prohibitive favorite to win the
overall league title with one more league meet remaining. Should the boy's team
win the championship it will be the first time the boy's team has won a league
championship since 1988. The top seven runners in this meet were Casey Nolan in
6th place (17:47 PR), Mubark Hasan in 9th place (17:57),
Seth Ansel in 12th place (18:13), Ryusuke Asami in 17th place (18:40 PR),
Rodrigo Juarez in 18th place (18:43 PR), Vincent McNelis in 21st place (18:46
PR) and Johannes Kraemer in 33rd place (19:44 PR).
9-21 - Lawrence Invitational
The boy's team really stepped up by winning the Lawrence Invitational despite
missing three out of the top 7 runners (Seth, Mubark, and Jayleen). In so doing,
Comstock boy's team beat five other schools and won by a comfortable margin over
second place Bloomingdale 38 to 67. Lawrence finished 3rd with 96, followed by
Fennville with 127, then Decatur with 138 and sixth place Hartford with 153.
This victory was secured by the front running of Casey Nolan (18:08), Rodrigo
Juarez (18:48 ), Ryusuke Asami (19:16), and Vincent McNelis (19:20) who all
finished in the Top 7 and sealed by Johannes Kraemer (20:59) who finished fifth
for the team and 22nd overall, only two places out of medalling. Casey and
Rodrigo were the top 2 finishers in the race.
9-17 - Mendon Invitational
The boy's team turned in one of its strongest team performances despite Seth
Ansel not running in the meet with the top five runners all running under 20
minutes. Even though this meet was not officially scored Comstock finished 3rd
out of field of 12 teams. In the process, four runners earned medals by
finishing in the Top 30. They were Mubark Hasan 9th (17:45 PR), Casey Nolan 16th
(18:48,) Vincent McNelis 22nd (19:09 PR), and Rodrigo Juarez 28th (19:30 PR). In
addition, several other runners on the team set PR's with Jaylen Neighbors
finishing 32nd (19:47 PR), Ryusuke Asami taking 42nd (20:19-awesome first race),
Sage DeCamp 105th (21:11-major PR), Johannes Kraemer (21:59 PR-great 2nd race),
Michael Rooney 117th (25:48 PR), Brad McIntrye 125th (27:17 PR).
Mendon Invite Results
9-13 - BCS Jamboree at Parchment - 1st Place
The boy's team took 1st place out of 8 teams in the 1st BCS Jamboree Meet which
counts 1/3 towards the League Championship Final Team Standings. This race puts
Comstock in position to win its first cross country league championship since
1998. This championship performance was made possible by the upfront running of
Casey Nolan (18:43) and Seth Ansel (18:55) who finished sixth and seventh in the
league meet which if the season ended today both runners would have earned 1st
Team All-Conference Honors. Also Mubark Hasan (19:29) turned in a clutch
performance after almost sitting out the meet with a hamstring injury but
instead finished 12th overall. He was followed by Rodrigo Juarez in 14th (19:53)
and Vincent McNelis in 23 (20:35) to round out the top 5. Stellar performances
were also turned in by Jaylen Neighbors and Garrett Green who even though they
were Comstock's 6th and 7th runners they still managed to finished ahead of the
4th runner from the 3rd place team in the meet and last year's defending BCS
Conference Championship team (Bridgman).
9-6 - Comstock 41 - Olivet 18
The boy's team without two of expected top runners (Travon Blakely and Mubark
Hasan) and the top runner from the last race (Seth Ansel) finishing a very
disappointing 8th for the team showed that this team which is currently ranked
2nd in Region 22 could finish 4th in our conference unless this team commits
itself between now and the end of the season to doing whatever it has to do to
be ready to race when the time comes to toe the line. On a day when the top
runners on the team were expected to excel against a strong Olivet team, it was
the first year runners on the team that stood out, notably Sophomore Jaylen
Neighbors who finished 2nd for the team in 21:36 as well as Junior Johannes
Kraemer who finished sixth for the team in 24:16. Thankfully one of the more
seasoned runners on the team, Casey Nolan, though not running his best was able
to challenge Olivet's No. 2 runner and finish a respectable 3rd overall in the
race in 20:27. The team wound up losing to Olivet 18 to 41 but the team will be
expected to bounce back next Tuesday when the team will run in its first
Conference Jamboree race worth 1/3 towards the final team standings.
8-27 - Muskegon Invitational
The boy's team for the first team this season the team ran with all of its
expected top runners and did well against very strong competition. The race
which featured 17 teams with ten Division I & Division II schools in the
field and 182 finishers allowed Comstock's Cross Country team to showcase the
potential of this year's team. Final meet results showed that Comstock tied for
8th with Division I Muskegon Reeths Puffer out of 17 teams, and beating 4
Division I & II schools. The team also came close to beating, Kent City, an
expected Divison III bubble State Championship Qualifying team even with the
fourth place finisher for the team, Casey Nolan, still nursing a leg injury. Key
to the team's success was the upfront running of Seth Ansel 18:08 and Mubark
Hasan 18:09 who both won awards for their Top 30 finishes with Seth and Mubark
placing 26 & 27th respectively. Also, the team received outstanding
performance from No. 3 runner Rodrigo Juarez who placed 43rd in 19:04 and
Vincent McNelis who rounded out the scoring with a 55th place performance in a
time of 20:00.
8-23 - Three Rivers Big Hill Climb
The boy's team again without the team's top 3 runners & two additional
runners that might run in the top 7 did not fare well in the overall meet
results taking 10th out of 11 teams. Nonetheless, the group that did run made up
of a large number of first year runners did put up a competitive effort and
there were a couple strong individual performances. Leading the way for the
boy's team was Vincent McNelis who ran 21:48 taking 44th place out of 128
runners on a very hilly course followed closely behind by Jaylen Neighbors 48th
in 22:06 and Rodrigo Juarez 51st in 22:07. These three runners, plus the five
who sat out this meet should make for a very strong team, especially since all
three of the above runners are expected to run much faster as the season
progresses.
9-23 Three Rivers Big Hill Climb
8-19 Lawrence Pre Run
On the boy's side, we took half of the team mostly first year runners (six
out of eight) and ran against 4 other schools at the Lawrence Summer Kickoff. In
this race, the boy's team finished fourth with Paw Paw winning it with 34
followed by Eau Claire with 49, Lawrence with 69, Comstock with 78, and Hartford
with 112. Two runners on the boy's side ran particularly well with Rodrigo
Juarez lowering his P.R. by 54 seconds in 19:50 and finishing 13/31 and Jaylan
Neighbors running in first XC race ever finishing 3rd for the team with an
excellent time of 22:06.
8-19 Lawrence Results