CROSS-COUNTRY : Belmont’s Girls Ready to Take on State’s Best

Patty Trejo has never had a problem with confidence. But despite her success on the Belmont High girls’ cross-country team, she often has to take a back seat to the boys.

The boys have won nine City championships in eleven seasons, including seven in a row from 1982-88, and the junior varsity has won 11 consecutive titles.

Now, Trejo and her teammates have a chance to catch up to the boys.

Trejo, Yolanda Gomez and Auria Roberto swept the first three places in the City finals to help Belmont win an unprecedented fourth City Section title, qualifying them for the State meet at Woodward Park in Fresno Saturday.

In 1990, Belmont became the first school to win boys’ and girls’ City titles in the same season. The Sentinels repeated the feat Nov. 14 in the City championships at Pierce College.

“When they talk about cross-country (at Belmont), they mainly talk about the guys,” said Trejo, a state finalist at 3,200 meters in track last spring. “People always go back to the 1980s. They always come up with the boys dominating the City. When they talk about the girls, they’re like ‘How good are they?’ ”

In the early days of the girls’ program at Belmont, not too good.

Only one girl came out during the first season in 1977 and there were not enough to field a team until two seasons later.

The girls advanced to the City finals for the first time in 1982, finishing eighth. They have qualified every season since, placing at least fourth. The Sentinels have won 41 dual meets in a row and 59 of 62 meets over the past eight seasons.

This season, Belmont’s girls’ team went undefeated in seven Northern Conference dual meets and took the first seven places at the conference finals.

Coach Gordon Weisenburger often looked to physical education classes to find runners. However, the 17-year coach said the achievements of the boys have been the best recruiting tool.

Typically, 35 to 40 runners come out for the girls’ team, compared to 65 to 70 for the boys.

Gomez’s brothers, Roman and Manuel, competed at Belmont. Roman was a two-time state 1,600- and 3,200-meter track champion in 1984 and 1985, and Manuel finished second in the 1985 City cross-country finals.

Weisenburger conducts a weekly time trial to determine those who will run. Competition among teammates, though, has not distracted from the team’s unity.

“All of us have a place on the team; it’s like a family,” senior Yalileth Giacoman said.

The squad must also rely on teamwork to navigate safely from Belmont, situated close to the heart of Downtown, through traffic-congested streets to nearby Echo or Elysian parks, where the team frequently logs up to 10 miles a day.

“The larger the group, the more dangerous it is getting them to the workout site . . . just the logistics of putting 100 kids on the street at once,” Weisenburger said. “Just that fact makes it remarkable to have a City champion coming from the center of town.”

Others aren’t so amazed, contending that Belmont’s competition is weak.

Last season, the Sentinels placed four runners among the top eight in last year’s City finals, but no Belmont runner was among the top 30 at the State meet. Belmont finished eighth in the Division I finals after placing 15th in 1989 and ninth in 1990 state meet.

“We always get put down because we’re from L.A.,” Trejo said. “Every time they mention the best, they always bring up the Agouras and (Palos Verdes) Peninsulas.”

That is starting to change.

Belmont won the Bell-Jeff Invitational at Griffith Park in September. Last month at the Kenny Staub Invitational, the Sentinels defeated two-time defending state champion Agoura to place second behind Peninsula, the state’s top-ranked team.

“Teams from the City traditionally aren’t as strong as those from the Southern Section, but that’s not the case with Belmont this year,” Peninsula Coach Joe Kelly said. “They’re for real.”

Trejo hopes to prove that Saturday.

“We have a lot of potential and we’re pretty strong,” Trejo said. “I think people are really starting to look up to us now.”