Garmer and Smith take KIL cross country titles

By Steve Williams

Freshman Jazzlyn Garmer and junior Anna Graves gave Webb School a 1-2 finish in the annual Knoxville Interscholastic League Cross Country Championships Saturday at Sequoyah Park.

Garmer and Graves posted unofficial times of 17:59 and 18:02, respectively, over the 5,000-meter course.

As for the boys' race, Knoxville Catholic sophomore Keegan Smith, one of the nation's top prep cross country runners, repeated as KIL champion as he had an unofficial time of 15:03. Farragut's Trevor Coggin continued his outstanding senior season by placing second with an unofficial time of 15:13.

The Webb girls and Farragut boys captured the KIL team championships.

Garmer ran in the KIL event last year as an 8th grader.

"It's a pretty fun race for me," said Jazzlyn. "Winning it gives me confidence going into other races like the state."

Smith felt he ran a pretty good race.

"I felt strong and confident going out there by myself," he said. "There was a little difficulty in the back part of the race to stay on it when I was all by myself. But I ran hard and finished strong and barely missed my PR and the course record, but I'm glad I got the win."

Smith said his PR (personal record) is 14:53 and the course record is 14:54.

Keegan will be defending his TSSAA state title later this season.

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