QHS cross country teams take third in regionals with Kuhl winning girls race at Bob Mays Park

QUINCY — Consistency was the name of the game for the Quincy High School cross country teams at Saturday’s Class 3A Quincy Regional at Bob Mays Park.

The Blue Devils boys and girls teams both finished third to qualify for the sectional meet in Normal.

Freshman Peyton Kuhl won the girls race with a time of 18 minutes, 11.97 seconds. Kuhl held off Edwardsville’s Madison Popelar by 3.27 seconds.

“With about a half mile to go, she’s like, ‘Well, I’m gonna take off and see what happens,’” Blue Devils coach Eric Davis said. “They couldn’t quite keep up. She held onto the lead from there, and she looked strong.”

Davis said Kuhl can be a jokester off the course, but she turns on those competitive juices when she needs to.

“She has fun with the team. She jokes around a lot, but she also puts in the work when she needs to,” Kuhl said. “I can always trust her to do what I ask her to. She’s pretty fun to watch. She seems to always have a good finish. She paces very consistently. I’m very confident in her.”

Senior Amick McClelland (19:10.07) finished 10th. Emily Arens ran a personal best 20:38.08 to finish third among Blue Devils runners and 21st overall. Amelia Knapp also set a personal record with a time of 20:56.90 in 25th overall. Abigail MacDonough finished in 20:40.44, one spot behind Arens.

On the boys side, Quincy occupied the 13th, 14th, 15th, 17th, and 22nd positions. Reed Steiner paced all Blue Devils in 16 minutes, 14.31 seconds.

“He had a calf injury last week, so he had a down week, but all of that pain went away, so today was pretty promising for him,” Davis said of Steiner. “He was up there with the top guys. He faded a little bit, but he recovered and worked his way back up.”

Gavin Slee finished 14th, seven seconds behind Steiner. Davis said Slee has been trending in the right direction as the season has progressed.

“His summer mileage wasn’t the greatest, so I knew the beginning of the year was going to be a little rocky for him. He pushed through some injuries for a while, but he’s feeling better now,” Davis said. “He could be our No. 1 any day. He’s really running strong right now.”

Justin Kappner set a personal record by finishing 15th in 16 minutes, 13.28 seconds.

“He was having troubles early in the season, too, just couldn’t get things rolling,” Davis said of Kappner. “He would run well in a race but just couldn’t finish well. He’s pulling it together now and running well.”

Cameron MacDonough (16:27.63) and Charles Ray (16:39.62) finished 17th and 22, respectively.

Edwardsville won the boys and girls team titles, and O’Fallon finished second in both divisions.