It was hot today for the high school races at the Texas A&M Invitational due to the college races taking priority in the earlier hours; so the racing conditions weren't the absolute best. Add that challenge with a surprisingly more difficult course than some might think. Tell that to Grapevine junior Adam Burlison and Noah Willows of Bridgeland who ran like it really didn't matter.
Burlison took out early to get into lead position and was holding strong. In the early goings, he got a good push from Klein seniors Gerardo Mendez and Thomas Kubala to get on a solid early pace. However, it was Burlison taking control and leading this race at pretty much a solo pace for most of it.
Willows would give a second half race push and closed ground on Burlison, but was unable to make up the ground established from the beginning and finished 18 seconds behind the winner from Grapevine. Burlison's winning time of 15:27 was just two seconds off the course record.
The team race was also between the squads of the first two individual finishers. Grapevine had their top returner from last year's record breaking and back-to-back UIL 5A state championship winning squad, Alberto Rayon. Rayon finished third with a time of 15:55 for his season opener.
Except for Willows and sophomore Benjamin Montgomery, the rest of the Bears finished outside of the top-10. Significantly putting in some work back in the thick of things in the race, Bridgeland finished with a 1:05 split for the No. 2-5 runners to score 72 points for the win over Grapevine with their 81 point total.
1 Adam BURLISON Grapevine [11] 15:27.0 2 Noah WILLOWS Bridgeland [12] 15:44.1 3 Alberto RAYON Grapevine [12] 15:55.8 4 Adrian HAHN VADSTEINKaty Cinco Ranch [12] 16:02.8 5 Gerardo MENDEZ Klein [12] 16:03.9 6 Rylan MALARCHICK Tomball Memorial [12] 16:13.1 7 Benjamin MONTGOMERY Bridgeland [10] 16:13.4 8 Payton CHAMBERS Conroe Grand Oaks [11] 16:16.1 10 Thomas KUBALA Klein [12] 16:25.4