LaPorte boys, Chesterton girls run to invite titles

LAPORTE | Rain delayed the Jack Bransford Classic for an hour, but that wasn't enough to stop two LaPorte runners from crossing the finish line first.

Mitch Hubner won the boys race for the second year in a row, in 16 minutes and 17 seconds, a full 29 seconds better than second-place finisher Pat Musgrave of Andrean.

"(The rain delay) was frustrating," Hubner said. "You go and get mentally prepared, and then right before the race starts, there's a delay. But every team is going through the same thing, so we try to do the best we can."

The Slicers, who lost several runners from last season, occupied five of the top 10 spots and won the team title. LaPorte totaled 28 points to out-pace Andrean (47) and Chesterton (71).

"It's more of a team thing," Hubner said. "I ran the first half of the race with the team, and the second half I made sure that no one was going to beat me."

Elena Lancioni went 19:16 in her first competition of the season, allowing the Slicers to claim the individual champion in each race. Lancioni's time was seven seconds faster than the one clocked by Andrean's Becca Conley.

"It felt good to get going and get the first win of the season," Lancioni said. "(Conley) had me the whole time, and I kept thinking that I didn't want her to beat me."

Kelly O'Shea of Wheeler was third behind Lancioni (20:33) and Conley. Chesterton won the team championship by grabbing the 4-10 positions. Linda Graff's 20:34 represented the Trojans' top performance.

"We had a nice pack today," Chesterton coach Brian Carden said. "Some times weren't super fast, but it was still fun to come out to dust off the cleats (and get running). We'll have to run faster if we want to have an impact in the conference."