The Mira Costa girls cross country ran strong at last week’s CIF-Southern Section prelims. Saturday, the Mustangs turned in another top effort in the finals, winning the Division 1 title at Mt. San Antonio College. The Mustangs led the field with 61 points. “I think they exceeded expectations,” Mira Costa co-coach Renee Smith said. “I thought they ran great at prelims and we thought we had a chance (this week) to win or get third.” Smith and Rebecca Kelley are the Mira Costa girls cross country coaches. Alana Clarke led the Mustangs with a time of 16 minutes, 48. 1 seconds. Her time was eighth-best in the field. Evelyn Ursini (16: 58. 6) and Isabella Amy (17: 03. 5) finished 12th and 15th, respectively. Mia Ritter (17: 04. 8) finished 17th and Kate Perrone (17: 13. 9) finished 20th. Smith pointed to Perrone’s late movement as a key. “The top five had good, solid races,” she said. “Kate (Perrone) moved up the whole race. She ran 17 seconds faster than last week and between mile 1 and 3, she past 10 people to finish.” The next stop for all qualifiers is the CIF State race Saturday at Woodward Park in Fresno. “We have another week of training, they’re excited and I think they will run even faster next week.” This is the first CIF-SS title for Mira Costa since the 2021 team won in Division 2. The other South Bay championship was won by the West Torrance boys in Division 3. The Warriors (71 points) were led by Dylan Mehnert, who finished fourth with a time of 14: 24. 2. Evan Tamura finished eighth at 14: 39. 0 as the Warriors won their first team title since 2021. “They executed the plan perfectly and raced well,” West coach Nick Lai said. “We knew it was going to be tough to win. They hung back in the first mile and made up a lot of ground in the second and third miles.” Lai said the group had a cautious approach in last week’s prelims due to the rain, but they all came back Saturday and improved their times. “We thought we could qualify (for CIF-SS finals) and didn’t want to push it all,” Lai said of last week’s races. “We wanted to stay safe.” Mehnert ran a 15: 01 in last week’s prelims. “He was fantastic,” Lai said of the senior. “He’s come a long way. He didn’t come out (to cross country) until his sophomore year and he was one of the guys at the back. Now he’s 12 minutes faster in his races.” Also in Division 3, Palos Verdes finished sixth (133 points), qualifying for state race. Blake Sigworth led PV with a sixth-place time (14: 31) and Lucas Nulman (14: 43. 2) finished 10th. In girls race, Palos Verdes (179 points) finished fifth to qualify for state. Ivanka Malysheva led the way with a time of 16: 57. 0. West missed out in the team qualifying, finishing in eighth place, but Kamilah Salim (16: 41. 4) finished third in the individual time to secure a spot in the state race. In Division 2, Peninsula’s Alexandra Himebauch finished ninth (16: 59. 7) to qualify for the state race. Both the Mira Costa and Redondo Union boys teams qualified in Division I. The Mustangs (79) finished fourth and the Sea Hawks (87) were fifth. Redondo’s Mario Montoya had the best time for either school, posting a 14: 19. 3, for a fourth-place finish. Carson Ehman (12th) led Mira Costa with a tie of 14: 31. 9.
https://www.dailybreeze.com/2025/11/22/mira-costa-girls-and-west-torrance-boys-cross-country-teams-win-cif-ss-titles/
Mira Costa girls and West Torrance boys cross country teams win CIF-SS titles
