MILBANK – Runners had to deal with heat and solid competition as they got their cross country seasons underway on during the Breathe Easy Meet on Monday.

Payton Brown of Milbank Area won the boys’ race, while Halle Bauer of Great Plains Lutheran topped the field in the girls’ division with temperature around 80 degrees at race time.

Aberdeen Roncalli was led by Paul Gutenkauf in the boys’ race finishing fifth in a time of 14:59.

“I thought Paul Gutenkauf had a very good meet,” said Roncalli coach Brady Lesnar. “I was hoping he would be in the 14s. He made it just by a second.”

Eighth-grader Matthew Peterson also finished in the top 10, taking eighth place.

“He’s very well developed for his age. He’s got good height and good build,” Lesnar said. “He’s a very strong swimmer and he carries that into the cross country season.”

Roncalli bunched up their runners in the girls’ race. A total of four Cavaliers were all within 48 seconds of each other, led by seventh-grader Addison Cassidy, who finished eighth.

“I thought she had an excellent meet,” Lesnar said. “We’re going to build off of it and hopefully continue to have a good season.”

The trio of Madisen Martin, Sarah Schmidt and Paige Schmidt finished 11th, 12th and 13th, respectively.

The Cavaliers will have another meet on Thursday when they travel to Redfield.

“We had about two and half weeks of solid practice. You could kind of tell by the end of that second full week, like OK we’re itching to run,” Lesnar said. “And now there’s going to be weeks where we’re like, oh man, I wish we just had a week to just focus on training. Every week from here on out through September we have two meets a week.”

BOYS’ DIVISION

 1, Payton Brown, Milbank Area, 13:22.14; 2, Kaleb Foltz, Tri-State, 13:44.06; 3, James Batchelor, Milbank Area, 13:54.28; 4, Bryan Meyer, Milbank Area, 14:41.08; 5, Paul Gutenkauf, Aberdeen Roncalli, 14:59.39; 6, Beckham Berry, Milbank Area, 15:07.21; 7, Isaac Graham, Milbank Area, 15:16.25; 8, Matthew Peterson, Aberdeen Roncalli, 15:33.43; 9, Drew Reetz, Webster, 15:40.23; 10, Ceejay Bissonette, Tiospa Zina, 15:41.99;

11, Garrett Griffin, Aberdeen Roncalli, 16:01.97; 12, Grayson Madsen, Tri-State, 16:07.49; 13, Grant Van Peursem, Milbank Area, 16:55.69; 14, Isaac Price, Aberdeen Roncalli, 16:37.57; 15, Tyler Clark, Great Plains Lutheran, 16:43.56; 16, Isaiah Berg, Great Plains Lutheran, 16:44.63; 17, Thad Kratz, Great Plains Lutheran, 16:51.33; 18, Tyler Berndt, Aberdeen Roncalli, 17:01.31; 19, Ben Bradley, Aberdeen Roncalli, 17:07.32; 20, Kelynn Mount, Aberdeen Roncalli, 17:13.59;

21, Tacey Miller, Webster, 17:14.09; 22, Jayven Maag, Waubay-Summit, 17:18.61; 23, Nolan Thuringer, Waubay-Summit, 17:23.43; 24, Isaiah Rydell, Tri-State, 17:33.43; 25, Matt Mork, Webster, 17:33.67; 26, Amsden Piotter, Tri-State, 17:37.50; 27, Kadin Raguse, Tri-State, 17:39.27; 28, Joshua Klein, Tri-State, 17:52.20; 29, Will Thuringer, Webster, 18:17.71; 30, Seth Grams, Great Plains Lutheran, 18:29.05;

31, Landon Czerwan, Great Plains Lutheran, 18:43.67; 32, Dominick Clark, Great Plains Lutheran, 18:58.74; 33, Jared Schimmel, Webster, 19:34.65; 34, Casey Litton, Tri-State, 21:01.37; 35, Reese Ziegler, Tiospa Zina, 23:32.15.

GIRLS’ DIVISION

1, Halle Bauer, Great Plains Lutheran, 15:26.68; 2, Ashlynn Batchelor, Milbank Area, 15:41.61; 3, Madison Zirbel, Waubay-Summit, 16:49.88; 4, Kynlee Speidel, Milbank Area, 17:26.08; 5, Taylor Bendix, Great Plains Lutheran, 17:29.67; 6, Maurina Street, Milbank Area, 17:49.18; 7, Leah Meyer, Milbank Area, 17:55.58; 8, Addison Cassidy, Aberdeen Roncalli, 18:00.61; 9, Tyra Berry, Milbank Area, 18:21.95; 10, Catie Neumann, Great Plains Lutheran, 18:20.77;

11, Ellie Neugebauer, Milbank Area, 18:27.32; 12, Madisen Martin, Aberdeen Roncalli, 18:29.22; 13, Sarah Schmidt, Aberdeen Roncalli, 18:36.97; 14, Paige Schmidt, Aberdeen Roncalli, 18:48.81; 15, Stella Wendland, Milbank Area, 18:55.28; 16, Eva Benike, Waubay-Summit, 19:18.83; 17, Erin Case, Webster, 19:20.86; 18, Morgan Navratil, Tri-State, 19:22.11; 19, Ella Hegg, Webster, 19:44.63; 20, Hannah Berg, Great Plains Lutheran, 20:02.28;

21, Jocelyn Rumpca, Webster, 20:11.83; 22, Daria Poor, Great Plains Lutheran, 20:38.80; 23, Ashlyn O’Farrell, Milbank Area, 20:53.48; 24, Emma Kanzenbach, Great Plains Lutheran, 21:14.81; 25, Macy Fritz, Tri-State, 21:58.06.