Morgan Hill – Consistency is key for 15-year-old Lance
Wolfsmith, who had two elite performances last Saturday and Sunday
to take his place in the record books.
Morgan Hill – Consistency is key for 15-year-old Lance Wolfsmith, who had two elite performances last Saturday and Sunday to take his place in the record books.
After taking a hard-fought second place amongst junior boys, and fourth place overall at the 13th Condor Earlybird Invitational at Toro Park in Salinas last Saturday, Lance changed gears and took first place in the sprint distnace Pacific Grove triathlon the next day.
Lance’s time of 15:51 in the three-mile race at the Earlybird Invitational put him into the top 25 boys all-time list at Toro Park.
The event, which included 52 athletes from schools from the Central Coast Section, is considered the first major cross country meet of the season,
Lance battled with Madera High School’s top junior runner Jesse Arellano for first place throughout the three-mile race, until Palma High School’s Tyre Johnson came from behind in the last mile to secure the win.
Sobrato head cross country coach Dave Wolfsmith, also Lance’s father, said Lance and Arellano paced each other throughout the race for first place, and by the time Johnson came up, Lance had no legs left.
“Now that he’s a junior I’m teaching him to race aggressively, but he already runs like that,” Dave said. “He made numerous surges to attack and wear down Arellano, and at the last minute Tyre was able to move ahead.
“Lance is racing to win, he’s not racing for a personal record,” Dave said. “Lance was racing Arellano, he didn’t know that Tyre was such a good runner … but now Lance knows how he runs, and the next time they meet, Lance will be prepared.”
Dave said Lance is not just a good runner, but he’s a racer with muliple weapons.
And on Sunday Lance proved he is also in an elite group of triathlets as well.
His time of 49:51 in the 14.6-mile sprint distance race at the Pacific Grove triathlon, which draws between 600 and 700 racers every year, broke the all-time course record of 50:28 set in 1997 by Chris Pendry of San Francisco.
Running as a member of the Morgan Hill-based triathlete group WolfPak, Lance completed the first leg of the triathlon, a .25-mile swim in 7:14.00.
He completed the second leg, a 12.4-mile bike in lightning fashion at 30:41.00, bringing him very close to the course record of 30:12.00.
On the last leg of the race, a 2 mile run, Lance pulled completely ahead of the other competitors finishing in 9:38, with a final record-shattering course time of 49:51.
“It’s amazing for him to make such a great start on the bike … Lance was so aggressive, he just dominated,” Dave said.
Other members of the Wolfpak had solid finishes including Kooper Knutson and Travis Saens who finished third and fourth in the 13-15 agge group with times of 1:01:43 and 1:01:52 respectively.
In the 17-19 age group Kyle Benton finished seecond wth a time of 57:09 and Derek Pesta was close behind in third place.
Lance’s mom Julie Wolfsmith, 41, took first place in the women’s 40-44 age group with a time of 1:05, and Amber Masoni won the 15-16 age group with a time of 1:11:43.
Live Oak sophomore cross country runner Trevor Watson competed in the Olympic distance triathlon on Saturday and took first place in his 15-and-under age group.
