WW South's Cepeda takes Stampede title

Batavia coaches had a plan for Patrick Redmond Saturday at the West Aurora Stampede, but the senior had his own ideas.

Redmond went out at lightning quick pace and was able to keep it up, running a career-best time of 15:28 to take third while leading the Bulldogs to a third-place finish in the 13-team field despite missing No. 1 runner Ryan Wieties.

"I didn't think I could go out at that pace but I moved up and I just believed in myself and I did things I never thought I could do," said Redmond who covered the first mile in 4:57.

"I just went out there and did what I could. My coach was telling me to back off a little bit but it was like, 'I can do this.'"

With 95 points Batavia trailed only Oswego East (82) and Wheaton Warrenville South (87).

Senior David Morrison (10th, 15:39), junior Shea Bastian (11th, 15:41), junior Zach Choffin (35th, 16:15) and sophomore Keaton Keller (36th, 16:15) made up Batavia's top five.

"I think the team ran amazing," Redmond said. "My coach told me and my friend Shea Bastian to go out at 15:40 and Shea did that and I obviously did better than that. Morrison did exactly what he was told to do and our other guys did what they were told to do. They were told to run around 16:15 and that's exactly what they did. They all followed the race plan."

The only two runners to finish ahead of Redmond know each other well from past races in the DuPage Valley Conference.

Connor McCue and his West Aurora teammates have since moved on to the Upstate Eight Conference, but McCue remembers racing Kyle Cepeda from Wheaton Warrenville South.

Cepeda won Saturday in a time of 14:45 with McCue second in 15:11.

"I knew there was going to be a lot of competition going into the race," McCue said. "I knew what to look for. I just think from the beginning I didn't put myself in position to win it. The first mile I took it out slow and played it conservative so I could finish strong. I started to catch him, he had 50 meters on me and I was closing, but then he had another surge and I couldn't make up for it."

West Aurora, who also had freshman David Castille take 13th in 15:45, finished in seventh place one spot behind St. Charles North. The North Stars were led by Hayden Joyce (17th, 15:49), Brett Lee (21st, 15:58), Max Markowicz (24th, 16:04), Chris Suda (26th, 16:05) and Joey Rangel (40th, 16:24).

Paul Bancroft paced eighth-place Marmion in 29th.

Eighth last week at the St. Charles North Invitational, Cepeda made a big move up. He took the lead at the mile and a half mark and pulled away from there.

"I was feeling great today," Cepeda said. "Our team has been practicing more speed work so we've been working on getting that faster start and I think we had it today. We worked together that entire first mile. That's what really helped pull me through.

"It felt really good and then to see my guys come in not too far behind me that was awesome."

Those guys included John Hanson in eighth, Drew Andersen 20th, Michael Hanson 28th, Kyle Thompson 30th and Jake Moscardini 31st.

"My class has been really strong since freshman year," Cepeda said. "We still have enough left on the team that we can compete really successfully."