<\/div>\n<\/p>\n
Only a cross country coach would shake your hand, look you right in the eye, and tell you he’s letting his team off light today by “only” making them run three miles. <\/span>But that’s because Pedro Ramirez and his Rams cross country squad usually run five to ten miles when they practice—”We go all over the city,” he said. <\/span>“Over to El Dorado, up to Heartwell, anywhere.” <\/span>Like all good coaches, Ramirez would never ask his team to do something he wouldn’t, and when they hit the sidewalk, he’s always with them.<\/span><\/p>\n The reason they’re practicing on the dirt track at Millikan Wednesday is that they have an all-important league meet on Thursday, one of only three meets all year. <\/span>The first, a few weeks ago at El Dorado, went incredibly well for Millikan, as they finished second place over Lakewood and Wilson for the first time in a few decades. <\/span>“Poly is the powerhouse,” Ramirez said, “But it’s always a good race for second between the other three schools.” <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n For the first time in a very long time, the leader of that chase pack is the Millikan Rams, led by standouts Paisley Pettway, a junior runner who’s currently outpacing the Rams’ other leader, senior Jeannette Ortiz, by about a second when Ramirez times them. <\/span>If they can run their best race on Thursday, under an October sun and with competition from the six other Moore League schools all around them, the Rams will hold their spot. <\/span>“If we can take second again tomorrow,” Ramirez told me, “Then we’re guaranteed at least a tie for second place after the final league meet.”<\/span><\/p>\n If you’re interested in coming out to see all seven schools racing a three-mile track on Thursday, the meet will be at Signal Hill’s Discovery Park, with the varsity boys’ race starting at 4:00 and the girls’ race at 4:30. <\/span>Otherwise, you can check back here in the evening for a writeup and highlight video, or just keep your eyes peeled around town—if you’re driving within ten miles of Millikan in the afternoon, you’re likely to see Ramirez and his girls hitting the pavement, trying to put some distance between themselves and the rest of the pack.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Rams’ girls’ XC program is off to the best start they’ve had in years, and they’re hoping they can keep it up on Thursday in another critical league meet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-5471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5471"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5471\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5471"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=5471"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}