Riley Trujillo is a student journalist at the Walter Cronkite school at Arizona State University assigned to cover the Desert Vista High School girls cross country team.

As the runners representing the Division I, Section III girls cross country programs took the line at the state qualifying race today, the race public address announcer spoke into the microphone interestingly and said, “A lot of people like the Desert Vista girls’ chances to win the title, next Saturday.” With expectations of the public spoken into the universe, the gun fired and the race began.

However, some of the usual runners for the Desert Vista Thunder didn’t take the course. The team decided on a strategy to rest some of their normal varsity starters, including Lauren Ping, Olivia Thatcher, Brooklyn Christofis and Katy Clausen.

Thunder assistant Coach Michael Bucci addressed the strategy of sitting girls after the race. “Our goal was to while safely qualify, give as many girls as possible the opportunity to do their best today… and we were needing to make some decisions about who gets to run our state meet based on that," he said. 

It was nearly 80 degrees at start time, but it felt much warmer. The sun was beating off of the grass which in turn created a humid atmosphere for the runners along the course. The run featured a few hills and altered between grass and dirt trails.

At the first turn, lead runners Caroline McLeskey from Highland and Grace Ping from Desert Vista ran closely together. Following behind them were teammates from both schools, and there wasn’t a runner outside of Highland or Desert Vista until nearly 11th place.

Eventually, McLeskey pulled ahead of Ping. Around the 13 minute mark of the race, she sustained a solid five-second lead ahead of her. McLeskey carried and grew on this lead throughout the remainder of the race eventually finishing with a time of 17:47.7. Ping finished shortly after, with a time of 18:23.8.

Highland took home the team win with 29 points, with runners finishing in the next five spots behind McLeskey and Ping. Desert Vista finished second with 42 points and took the three remaining spots in the top ten.

But the regional win wasn’t the primary focus for either of the leaders. “I know I couldn’t take it too hard, because we have state next week, so this was kind of like a run to win," McLeskey said. "I knew Grace was here and I knew she would push me, so I ran the first mile with her and said, 'Let’s see how this goes.' ”

Ping also brought up McLeskey when talking about her race strategy. She said, “I knew that Caroline McLeskey had been having a lot of good races, so I figured if I tried to stick with her and I stayed as relaxed as possible, I would have a good race.”

Ping, who still is recovering from an injury, reflected on how she felt about her race by saying, “Um, not great, but good for where I’m at, I guess.”

Meanwhile, McLeskey also noted her focus on the upcoming state title. “That one is just all out… I’m a senior and everything I’ve been working for goes into that race," she said. "Even if I don’t win, I will be on the ground throwing up… that will be everything I have.”

Coach Bucci noted the conclusion of the day from the team and said, “Job one is to qualify for state. We are thrilled we got it done and we are gonna go celebrate that as a team.”

Both Highland and Desert Vista will have seven eligible spots for runners in the state tournament next weekend.