In August, Covington Catholic senior Joe Mayer didn’t know why his right knee hurt.
Mayer didn’t know Saturday, either, but it hardly mattered. He won the boys Class 2A cross country title at the Kentucky Horse Park.
Mayer’s time of 15 minutes, 44.15 seconds was a little more than 10 seconds faster that Daniel Filiatreau of Thomas Nelson’s 15:54.38.
“I’m incredibly proud of him and really happy for him because it would have been easy to tap out any number of times and say, ‘Well, this isn’t just it’s not going to happen for me this year’,” CovCath coach Jeremy Mosher said. “And he’s persevered, and it speaks, I think, what a competitor he is. I would never bet against him.”
Saturday was also Mayer’s first individual state title; he was part of the Colonels’ winning 4×800 team in 2023.
“But so many people who went into this – all my coaches, all my teammates, my family … (I) just felt that power with me the whole way, so obviously not a sole effort,” Mayer said.
From early June to mid-August, Mayer missed much of the summer training.
“It wasn’t any sort of accident or anything, guessing just a little bit too much stress,” Mayer said.
Mayer couldn’t run, so he tried to keep up his aerobic fitness up pedaling on the elliptical bicycle.
“But yeah, it was tough getting into it; had some real struggles and workouts in early races,” Mayer said.
Mayer started the year with a 24th place finish at the Franklin (Indiana) Invitational Aug. 30 with a 5K time of 16:44.2. He won the Diocese of Covington in 16:46.35, finished second at the Jim Murray Memorial in 16:09, 79th at the Nike XC Town Twilight in Terre Haute, Indiana (in 15:59.20) and second at the Northern Kentucky Athletic Conference/St. Henry Invitational (16:00.30).
Mayer turned in his season-best time at last week’s Class 2A, Region 4 meet at Idlewild Park, winning with a 15:38.05.
PHOTOS: Class 2a cross country slideshow provided by Charles Bolton
Saturday, Mayer and Filiatreau were stride-for-stride pretty much the entire race. Mayer’s objective: not getting boxed in by other runners.
“And I think I did a pretty good job of that,” Mayer said. “And then, Daniel’s obviously a great runner. (I) didn’t want to let him go at any point, and I think I stayed pretty close throughout the race and had that gear at the end.”
Mayer let Filiatreau lead for most of the first mile.
“I figured it was, you know, kind of smart to let him do what he was willing to do early and cover moves,” Mayer said.
Mayer and Filiatreau traded leading until the last half-mile. “I wanted to make a big move, and I think I executed it pretty well,” Mayer said.
CovCath’s two-year team championship reign ended. Lexington Catholic placed five runners in the top 30 to edge the Colonels, 56-67. The Knights also won the Region 4 meet last week.
“I mean, a ton of credit to LexCath; they were awesome,” Mosher said. “We raced them the very first week of the season without Joe and beat them pretty handily, and they have progressed and progressed and progressed. They put together a great race last week, and one of the hardest things to do is to be at your best two weeks in a row, and they pretty much did it.”
Drew Kurtzner was the second Colonel in, placing 10th in 16:52.83. Following him were John Nerswick in 13th (16:56.83), Jackson Germann in 20th (17:22.39), Luke McLane in 27th (17:29.70), Jack Salyers in 29th (17:32.46) and Braden Franxman in 76th (18:41.41).
LexCath’s girls emphatically completed the team title sweep with a 44-114 win over Bourbon County. Thomas Nelson’s Baili Hoten won in 18:32.15.
For complete results, visit here.