Fleshman’s Ache Feels So Good

It was just an ordinary, everyday cramp runners often get.

Lauren Fleshman of Canyon High was gleeful about it Saturday after finishing third in the girls’ individual sweepstakes race of the Mt. San Antonio College Invitational cross-country meet.

Fleshman, a junior, was forced to drop out of the Woodbridge and Kenny Staub invitationals earlier this season with severe stomach cramps. But she felt only a little ache in her side in the final 400 yards this time while finishing in 17:55 over the three-mile course.

The time shattered Fleshman’s school record of 18:14 set last year and was five seconds faster than Kim Mortensen of Thousand Oaks ran over the same course as a junior in 1994.

“I really wanted to break 18,” Fleshman said. “I wanted to do it last year, but I might have been expecting a little too much from myself. I wanted to do it because Kim Mortensen ran 18 minutes as a junior and I wanted to beat that. . . . I figured there’s no way I can do what she did as a senior so I wanted to get that junior mark.”

Mortensen ran 17:14 at Mt. SAC as a senior and won the 1995 national cross-country title before clocking a national high school record of 9:48.59 in the 3,200 meters in track.

Canyon, powered by Fleshman and Erin White’s 13th-place finish in 19:13, finished fourth in the team standings with 150 points.

The Cowboys had the same point total as third-place Camarillo, but dropped to fourth on the tiebreaker because Camarillo had a higher-finishing sixth runner.

Santa Rosa, paced by winner Trina Cox, placed first with 92 points and Thousand Oaks was second with 100 points. Junior Amanda Armstrong was 18th and freshman Kelly Hess placed 19th with identical times of 19:50 for Thousand Oaks.

Fleshman ran a well-paced race to set her school record.

Nicole Portley of Aragon led at the first mile in 5:16, with Cox sixth in 5:23 and Fleshman 10th in 5:36.

Fleshman was in fourth at two miles, 18 seconds behind Cox and senior Yvonne Liebig of Sacramento Kennedy, and she moved into third shortly thereafter.

Cox finished in 17:29 and Liebig in 17:42.

Quartz Hill ran a mediocre race, by its standards, in the girls’ team sweepstakes race, but the Rebels still finished third with 195 points.

Yucaipa, ranked No. 2 in the nation by Harrier magazine, placed first with 78 points and Anaheim Esperanza was second with 141.

Senior Kimi Welsh of Yucaipa won in 17:29 to tie Cox for the best girls’ time in the two-day meet.

Senior Danielle Day placed third in 18:34 and freshman Shell Blevins was 12th in 19:04 for Quartz Hill.

“It was a flat race for us, but that’s OK,” Quartz Hill Coach Kelly Marsh said. “Better now than later.”

Senior Isabel Casillas of Hoover had the fastest boys’ time of the day among runners from the region and Thousand Oaks won the first of four Division I boys’ races.

Casillas clocked 15:40 to place sixth in the individual sweepstakes race and help Hoover finish fifth with 180 points.

Thousand Oaks tied Yucaipa for first in its race with 101 points, but the Lancers won because they had a faster sixth runner.