Complaints, even excuses, flew freely after the girls’ cross country race Sept. 9 at Edward Little High School.

Hurricane Irene wreaked havoc on many of the wooded trails in the tri-county area. Even after two nearly dry weeks, the running loop at Edward Little High School was no exception.

Lewiston coach T.J. Niles broke away from congratulating and consoling his girls’ squad after their finish to take advantage of the teachable moment with his boys at the starting line.

“I just told them, ‘Today is what cross country is about. It’s about being tough.’ A lot of kids start running through the puddles and the mud and they say, ‘This sucks,’ and they slow down,” Niles said. “On those kind of days, it’s not about being fast. It’s about being tougher than the person next to you.”

The Blue Devils didn’t back down, or even slow down much.

Multiple personal records fell, and Lewiston logged an eye-opening victory, 36 points to 43, over Mt. Ararat.

There aren’t many quicker ways to get the attention of the rest of the schools in the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference or Eastern Class A.

Mt. Ararat is the defending champion of each. The Eagles finished second in the state to Scarborough a year ago.

“It’s not like we have a guy who’s going to win (individual) states, but we have a strong team,” Niles said. “That’s what it takes in cross country.”

The Devils have a dynamite one-two punch in Mohamed Barre and Kevin Lavertu.

Some days, it’s Lavertu hitting the tape first. Others, it’s Barre. In the meet at EL, it was Barre overcoming the conditions to finish third overall and set an unlikely PR of 18:14.9.

How unlikely?

“Andy Reifman-Packett of Mt. Ararat won the race. He’s a kid who can run 17 (minutes) flat on any given course any day, and he ran a 17:52,” Niles said. “That’s how slow it was.”

Lavertu was only five seconds off Barre’s pace.

The Devils had two runners in the 19-minute bracket, Mohamed Awil and Mohamed Mohamed, and three more — Matt Chouinard, Jordan Balsamo and Andrew Balsamo — nearly breaking the 20-minute threshold.

That close competition benefits the Devils, with each tier of runners pushing one another.

“My one and two are very close. My three and four are very close. And my five, six and seven are right on each other,” Niles said. “We don’t have one guy who’s that much better than everybody else.”

Lewiston received votes in the University of Southern Maine High School Cross Country Coaches Poll this week, the only local boys’ program to enjoy that distinction.

It’s the best start to a season for the team since winning the Class A championship in 2007, and it comes despite the inconvenience of having no home course.

That detail was supposed to be taken care of this year. In fact, the EL meet was originally Lewiston’s home date.

Again, blame it on Irene.

“All the work that had been done was ruined. Culverts were washed out. Pipes were moved around. It wasn’t pretty,” Niles said.

Lewiston athletic director Jason Fuller has worked with the city to get the Devils on a waiting list for repairs, but waiting is the operative word.

“There are four projects in front of ours,” Niles said. “We will host a meet again, but it probably will be next year.”

Knowlton buzzes to win

Lucy Knowlton of Leavitt won the girls’ race in Auburn, overcoming the challenging conditions with a time of 22:39.81. Maddie Wiegman finished fourth for the Hornets, who were a distant second to Mt. Ararat.

Nicole Court-Menendez was the top Lewiston runner in eighth. Crystal LaBonte of Edward Little ran 10th.

Two EL boys sandwiched themselves around Lewiston’s Barre and Lavertu in the top five. Justin LeClair was second to Reifman-Packett with a time of 18:05.37. Luc Bourget (18:27.69) took fifth.

Sneaker tracks

Other top local performers this week:

 Poland freshman Kristina Smith finished second with a time of 20:16 in a meet against NYA and Greely.

• Winthrop placed four boys in the top six to edge host Boothbay in an MVC competition. Kameron Souza (second), Marc Hachey (third), Dylan Berney (fifth) and Ben Allen (sixth) showed the way for the Ramblers.

• In that same meet, Lisbon was the only school with enough runners to post a team score in the girls’ race. Meagan Thomas, Angelica Bulgin and Kristen Carter went 2-3-4 for the Greyhounds.

• The Mt. Blue girls finished second to Brunswick in a large KVAC meet at Lawrence. Addie Cullenberg (third) and Louisa Stancioff (fourth) chased Lawrence’s Erzsebet Nagy and Brunswick’s Teresa Murphy to the line. For the Mt. Blue boys, Justin Tracy was fourth and Sully Jackson fifth in the event, which drew a total of 212 runners for the two races.

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