Mixx
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In the Girls Sub-Five 19 girls came from five western states to go for the five minute challenge. At the line was the returning National Champion of both
the 1500m and the 3000m in the Midget age group-Amy-Eloise Neale from Snohomish, Washington and three other girls who had already run Sub-Five....Kristin Coffman, Tracey Stoltz, Emily Nist, and Paige Rice. It was a big group at the line and after the first lap Paige Rice took the lead with the pack on her shoulders. It was pretty much Rice-Neale on the last lap until Neale broke away on the back stretch. Neale was at least 10meters ahead of Paige Rice and it looked like a sure win for her....but Paige didn't see it that way and unleashed a terrific kick and won the race by leaning in a little farther than Amy. She set a national record for her age group of 4:40.58 and a win over 7th grader Amy Eloise Neale's time of 4:40.61
The Boys Sub-Five Mile race was a show down between Tate Scheinbein of Liberty, Indiana and Cody Curtis of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho who both had a best time of 4:21 coming into the race. Daniel Melove from Sandy, Utah had earlier run a 4:29. We knew something about Tate because at age ten he was on the cover of Youth Runner Magazine and we'd done a short story about him. All we knew about Cody was 4:21. The gun went off and Tate blasted immediately into the lead from the outside starting lane....but on this day Cody pulled it out and won the show down in 4:34.03 with Tate's time at 4:38.12.
