The Landmark Christian School boys cross-country team won the Region 5A championship Saturday at Sandy Creek High School with a low score of 17 points.

Fairburn's War Eagles will go for their second straight state title Saturday at 8:30 a.m. in Carrollton.

Despite the lack of strong competition, the Landmark runners challenged each other in attempting to better their times.

Blake Fertitta positioned himself in first, and remained there for the entire race, winning with a time of 16:38. Clark Rivers was second at 16:55.

Eric Sumner ran one of his best times of the year in 17:57.

The remaining runners for LCS finished in the following order: Joseph Register, fifth (18:20); Scott Emery, sixth (18:34); Johnathan Best, seventh (18:40); and Dustin McDonald, eighth (18:50).

The LCS girls had their best performance of the year, capturing the region title for the first time ever. They not only qualified to run in the state meet but also ran their best team time of the year 1:57.56, just under the state qualifying time of 1:58.0 for Class A schools.

Several of these young ladies have cut as much as five minutes off their 5K time. Melissa Register, the only senior running for Landmark, came in ahead of everybody with her best time of the year (21:50).

Finishing behind Melissa for LCS were Mary Michael Joiner in fifth place (23:39); Courtney Piribek, sixth (23:48); Kate Bailey, seventh (23:50); and Jenny Cone, eighth (24:49).

Other finishers for Landmark were Layla Constable (25:18) and Danielle Taussig (25:27).

Jeff Noble and Tim Fritz ran away with the JV meet with times of 19:22 and 19:54, respectively. Landmark's other JV runners finished in this order: Jordan Lytton, 20:03; Darren Lee, 21:52; Alan Gay, 23:28; and Matt Coffey, 28:42. Meredith Gable ran her best time of the year in 26:34, followed by Sarah King, who ran with an injured foot and finished in 30:42.

Running a two-mile course, James Register finished in first place in boys middle school competition with a time of 12:08, while J.T. Piribek finished at 14:23 and Albert Jumper at 14:28.

Among elementary boys, Michael Leonard finished in a time of 13:17. In girls elementary, Katherine Register finished with a time of 15:38.

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