Ryan Murken
Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – Up until last month Kolby Greiner was unbeaten at the Ashton Cross Country Course.

A wrong turn at the newly configured home course for West High cost Greiner a title at his home invite and his unblemished mark at Ashton.

Greiner returned to his winning ways at the Ashton Course on Thursday but that wasn’t what had the West High junior most excited.

An individual title from Greiner helped No. 8 West High to a runner-up finish at the Class 4A state qualifying meet and a seventh consecutive state meet appearance.

“Today the goal was just to get the win and do my part to try to get the team in,” Greiner said. “We have a great group of guys and I really want to do my part for them because we have a lot of young kids and I just want to carry them into state. Not everyone gets to go to state as a sophomore or a junior so it’s a pretty big opportunity for these guys.”

Third-ranked Cedar Rapids Prairie put four runners in the top 10 on its way to winning the team title with 41 points.

On the strength of Greiner’s individual title West High emerged from a group of three other ranked teams to secure a spot at state.

The Trojans finished with 68 points to edge No. 14 Cedar Rapids Washington for the runner-up spot.

No. 13 Cedar Falls placed fourth with 98 points and had a string of 25 consecutive trips to state come to an end and City High finished fifth with 119 points, failing to qualify for state for the third time in the 29 years.

“Prairie is an excellent team and they have a real shot at going for a trophy next week and then there is a cluster of us here today,” West High coach Brian Martz said. “We knew it was going to be four or five teams trying to get that third spot or better and we were fortunate to get it.”

Greiner continued his strong junior season with his third consecutive win since a runner-up finish at the West High home meet last month.

The junior won the individual crown in 16:07.5, more than 11 seconds faster than runner-up Robert Laue of Cedar Rapids Prairie.

Greiner has battled a back injury for much of the season but it hasn’t stopped him from entering next week’s state meet at Lakeside Golf Course in Fort Dodge on a three-meet winning strak.

“The pain is still there but I’ve kind of made a decision and said ‘who cares, let’s just gut it out for the rest of the season’,” Greiner said. “I’d pretty much do anything with that back pain for this team.”

Greiner had help on Thursday.

Junior Yousif Salama, sophomore Ken Wilbur and senior Ethan Trepka all finished in the top 20.

Salama was 13th in 16:59.1 while Wilbur was 15th and Trepka was 18th.

“The main objective is to qualify for the state championship race and the guys earned it, they deserve to be there, they belong in the state meet so we get another chance to improve,” Martz said. “I told the kids yesterday at practice it was going to go into the third mile, you are going to have to compete all the way to the end just like we did at conference. I think they might have been a little nervous today because it’s a test but they managed to hold it all together.”

Quenton Max finished 11th in 16:48.9 to lead City High and secure a spot at the state meet.

Class 4A State Qualifying Meet

At Ashton Cross Country Course in Iowa City

Boys Results

Team scores – 1. Cedar Rapids Prairie 41; 2. West High 68; 3. Cedar Rapids Washington 72; 4. Cedar Falls 98; 5. City High 119; 6. North Scott 158; 7. Muscatine 186; 8. Western Dubuque 200; 9. Waterloo West 242.

Individual Results – 1. Kolby Greiner (ICW) 16:07.5; 2. Robert Laue (CRP) 16:18.9; 3. Brandon Conrad (CF) 16:27.8; 4. Khory Nobles (CRW) 16:32.2; 5. Paul Schneidermann (CRW) 16:34.1; 6. Max Locher (CRW) 16:37.6; 7. Max Laue (CRP) 16:38.7; 8. Colton LaGrange 16:40.1; 9. Caleb Burjes (CF) 16:43; 10. Jack Pendergast (CRP) 16:48.4; 11. Quenton Max (ICH) 16:48.9; 12. Tyler Olson (MUS) 16:49.5; 13. Yousif Salama (ICW) 16:59.1; 14. Elijah Vlasek (CRP) 17:03.5; 15. Ken Wilbur (ICW) 17:21.1.

City High – 11. Quenton Max 16:48.9; 25. Eric Thomas 17:36.2; 26. Owen Jones 17:37.9; 27. JP Rethwisch 17:38.4; 30. Lucas Firmstone 17:44.8; 34. James Momberg 17:50.1; 60. Caden Turnbough 19:09.2.

West High – 1. Kolby Greiner 16:07.5; 13. Yousif Salama 16:59.1; 15. Ken Wilbur 17:12.1; 18. Ethan Trepka 17:18.1; 21. Ethan Goers 17:23.2; 22. Kyle Sulwer 17:24.1; 24. Will Conrad 17:26.3.