Blankenship, a senior at Columbia River, repeated as district champ. His time of 15 minutes, 19 seconds was 39 seconds faster than the second-place runner Aidan Lowman of Kelso.
Blankenship led five Columbia River runners in the top nine — Ian Rose placed third, Daniel Nehnevaj was fourth, Ryan Boe was seventh and Keegan Hanes rounded out the Chieftains scorers in ninth. The Chieftains’ 24 points were half that of second-place Kelso.
The rain didn’t bother Blankenship, who led by 20 seconds at the one-mile mark and continued to push the pace.
“It’s Washington,” he said. “Getting muddy and having fun is what cross country is all about.”
When approaching a puddle, some runners opted to go around the edges.
Ferris wasn’t having any of that.
“With this sort of race, you just run through them,” Ferris said. “If you run around them, you’re adding so much to the race and it trips you up mentally. You’re going to be wet, so you just have to accept that. By the end, you just don’t care.”
Ferris is looking to build on her 16th-place finish at last year’s state meet.
“I’m really happy with it,” Ferris said of her race Wednesday. “I gave it my all. You can’t look at times because they’re going to be slower.”
Four teams competed Wednesday with the top three earning berths to the bi-district meet. Prairie, Columbia River and Kelso were the team qualifiers in both the boys and girls races.