- December 5, 2025
FPC's Jada Williams finished 11th at the Bobcat Classic. File photo
Zach Spooner of Matanzas won the Panhandle Challenge by nearly five seconds. Courtesy photo
With the district meets about two weeks away, the Flagler Palm Coast and Matanzas cross country teams traveled to a couple of big meets last weekend to get some preparation in.
Senior Jada Williams led the FPC girls to a fourth-place finish among 20 teams at the Oct. 9 Bobcat Classic at Santa Fe College in Gainesville. Williams ran 19:41 to finish 11th overall among 154 runners.
Matanzas junior Zach Spooner won the boys race at the Panhandle Cross Country Challenge in Panama City on Oct. 9 to lead the Pirates to a third-place finish out of 18 teams. Spooner won the race by nearly five seconds with a time of 16:34 on a muddy course at Bay Dunes Golf Club.
Seabreeze's Nickole Dane finished 19th at the Bobcat Classic with a time of 20:32.70 to help the Sandcrab girls to an eighth-place team finish. Seabreeze's Ella Chandler ran 20:40.20 to place 22nd.
FPC's Cassidy De Young was 23rd (20:42.10). Also running well for the Bulldogs in the girls 5K race were Genesis Epstein, who was 28th at 21:10.10, and Savannah O'Grady, who was 35th at 21:34.50.
Sean Gilliam led the FPC boys, finishing 24th with a time 17:37.90. Barak Olago was 30th at 18:01.30. The Bulldog boys finished sixth.
At the Panhandle Challenge, Matanzas' Hunter Smith finished 15th in the boys race with a time of 17:55 and Jaden Smith (18:23) and Andrew Hatten (18:24) finished 27th and 28th respectively.
The Matanzas girls placed seventh at the meet with Mariah Mills (22nd place, 21:28), Nina Rodriquez (23rd, 21:29) and Lauren Marshall (29th, 22:02) leading the way.
