PASCO — Well after Zane McAferty crossed the finish line, he went to a part of the fence overlooking Sun Willows Golf Course.
No one was within speaking distance of him. He dropped his head a couple times while leaning forward. His eyes were a little red, too.
The emotions of the Tumwater High School senior were aplenty.
“I’m thinking of it all,” McAferty said. “All the work I’ve done to get here and really how much fun I’ve had all four years.”
As the unquestioned captain and leader of the Thunderbirds, McAferty was able to accomplish a couple things in his last race in the green and white.
Placing 58th amongst the rest of the Class 2A field was the best McAferty finished and to boot, a time of 17 minutes, 10.40 seconds was a five-second improvement from last season. His third and final time running in Pasco ended up as his finest 5,000-meter trek out east.
“It is really cool and I left it all out there,” McAferty said.
Like the bounty of upperclassmen that came before him, McAferty has seen what leadership looks like. And with the three-headed pack of Hayden Newman, Tyler Clark and himself, it was even more paramount to lead by example.
And the fun of it was a cherry on top.
“Having two people to train well with, in workouts and races, it worked out,” McAferty said.
Like so many races this fall, those three aforementioned top guys were tightly packed in together. It wasn’t until from the second mile on where McAferty started to break away from his teammates.
Over the final 1.1 miles, he passed eight guys to go from outside the top-65 to inside the top-60. Clark placed 75th and Newman finished 88th. This may have been the final cross country race for McAferty, who said he may go to trade school post-graduation.
He leaves grateful for what the sport meant to him.
“I couldn’t let myself finish not up, if that makes sense,” McAferty said. “Give it all I had. It is all you can do. (XC) changed my life, it taught me how to work hard and push hard in life.”
Another senior had his swan song down in Class 1A.
While a new lifetime best was just out of reach, Tenino’s Carter Mounts went from 91st last year to 42nd on Saturday and his time was over 40 seconds faster. He ran 17:16 in his final cross country race of his prep career.
“I’m still happy with the result, it is definitely tender,” Mounts said. “It was a good day. This year, it was more to do with physical things.”
It caps a season where last week at districts, Mounts went under 17 minutes for the first time ever and registered four top-five placements, including a win at the Beavers’ home meet.
“This sport has been a lot for me,” Mounts said. “It has meant so much, every race.”
Tenino’s two other qualifiers – Josiah Marzolf and Sevrin Mickelson – placed 129th and 139th – respectively. Rochester’s Kian Christiansen ran 18:19-flat to cross the line in 94th place for his state meet debut.
Like McAferty, running at the next level is uncertain for Mounts. He still has his final track and field season before anything collegiately takes place.
The memories made, in Mounts’ eyes, will last a lifetime.
“All the low points or high points, I’m so happy with my time in cross country,” he said. “I’m trying to take things step-by-step.”
