The Bradford girls cross country team finished seventh out of 21 schools at the Tri-State Coaches Association meet in California Thursday.

“With Districts being a week away, we needed a high quality meet to get one last race in,” Lady Owls coach Mark Kelley said. “This was a very challenging course with a pretty big climb at the two-mile mark. ”

Korie Dixon led the way for Bradford with a sixth-place finish in 20:57.

“Korie really ran a complete race,” Kelley said. “She got out strong in the first mile, pushed the 2nd mile and finished hard. She went from 10th to 6th in the last mile.”

Caitlyn Taylor was 29th in 22:56.

“Caitlyn ran a very hard race and closed in the last mile,” Kelley said. “She passed about seven girls in the last mile.”

Elisa Hayden (24:34) was 63rd and Leila Bines (24:35) was 64th in 24:34 and 24:35, while Abby Schleicher (25:43) finished 88th.

“Elisa and Leila ran hard together the entire race,” Kelley said. “This is going to to critical next week at districts.This was Abby’s best race of the year. She stayed close to Leila and Elisa and passed a number of girls in the last 200m.”

Aubrey Cruz was 97th in 26:00, Mayla Smith was 112th in 26:42, Kendall Gracey Dalton was 124th in 27:27 and Karsyn Gracey Dalton was 132 in 28:15.

“Everybody ran hard in the race. The goal was to get a quality race in and not worry about time,” Kelley said. “It was a long trip to Cal but it was worth the drive. All of the District 7 schools were there, so it was a good number of quality schools and runners.”

The Lady Owls will run at 1:15 next Saturday in Ridgway at the District 9 championship.