As Dominic Toretto said in “The Fast and the Furious,” “It doesn’t matter if you win by an inch or a mile.” That lesson was taken to heart by Sedona Red Rock High School’s girls cross country team at the Arizona Interscholastic Association Sectionals Crossroads qualifier on Nov. 4.

Due to COVID-19 restrictions, only the top-three teams at sectionals were going to qualify for State. The top two teams of Northland Prep and Valley Christian were well ahead of the rest of the field, leaving SRRHS to battle with Gilbert Classical Academy, which was at its home turf. Cross country meets normally take only the best five runners from each school, but the Scorpions and Spartans tied for third with 94 points each. That opened things up to a tiebreaker.

That ended up being a good thing for Sedona. When two teams are tied, the sixth runners enter the equation. The Scorpions’ sixth runner, freshman Arabella Licher, finished in 29:20.3, ahead of Spartans senior Rachel Ouellette [29:38.7]. That 18.4-second gap allowed the SRRHS girls to qualify for the State meet.

“I didn’t even remember how a cross country tiebreaker worked,” Sedona coach Ben Scamihorn said. “Because they never happen.”

As they’d been through the season, the Scorpion girls were paced by freshman Skyla Bird [22:15.3], sophomore Jackie Palmer [23:35.7] and junior Yaritza Landa [23:56.3]. Bird was likely headed for a second place finish but made a wrong turn late in the race. She recovered in time to finish sixth, earning a medal in the process. Palmer finished 14th and got a medal as well, while Landa just missed a medal, finishing 17th.

The fourth girl was a relative newcomer to the Sedona team, sophomore Lupita Herrera. In only her second race, Herrera set a personal record [28:34.5], improving upon her previous PR by roughly four minutes. Freshman Soyoka Yabuuchi [29:02.7] rounded out her team’s top five.

“I think it went really good,” Bird said of her team’s race. “I was actually surprised with where I was in my race. I was second until the last 400 meters. Lupita really stepped it up and I think our team did really good.”

“It was my second race,” Herrera added. “I don’t think the track was much different. There were still some uphills. But I was trying to keep up with my team.”

Sedona’s boys finished sixth. In a non-COVID year, that would have been good enough to qualify as a team. But in 2020, the Scorpions were left 10 points shy.

Despite that, the Sedona boys will be represented. Junior Shota Yabuuchi [17:14.5] finished second overall at sectionals while sophomore Korbin Burke set a personal record [19:10.2]. The top-seven individuals from non-qualifying teams qualify for State as individuals. Both Yabuuchi and Burke fit into that window.

“I was really proud of myself,” Burke said. “I didn’t really know what to expect of myself because I missed a lot of the season. But I got a PR this meet. That felt really good. And I got a medal as well because I placed 14th.”

State will be held on Friday, Nov. 13, at Crossroads Park in Gilbert. That will be a familiar trail for the Scorpions, as it’s the same trail that Sectionals was held at. A key difference is that while the temperatures at Sectionals were in the 90s, they’re expected to be in the 60s at State, creating more favorable conditions.

The Scorpion girls are all set to return in 2021, as will both of the boys who qualified. In fact, the Sedona boys had only one senior [Francisco Bekele] in their regular top 7. Being a young team, they’re looking forward to getting some experience at state.

“It’s going to be an interesting meet.” Shota Yabuuchi said. “There will be a bunch of guys on the same level or even higher than me. It will be a good experience for next year since we are still a young team.”