2023 Ratings: Week 3, Division 1

It’s that time! We’re back again with rankings, both for teams and individuals. Three weeks into the season, plenty of rust busted, times dropped, and a bit of clarity towards our top teams and athletes.

If you’ve followed these over the past few years, you may know the gist of these, but let’s break it down once again:

The individual ratings take into account all the meets listed here. There are a few meets missing that I’ll link to, but pretty much any meet with a significant number of athletes will have been calculated. An individual’s rating takes their best 75% of rated races (rounding up, so 4 of 5, 5 of 6, etc.), weighs them with more recent races having a higher weight, then spits out a final rating. The team rankings score those individuals as if they were in a meet against their entire division.

There are a few changes from previous years:

• No more ratings of weekday, conference meets
  • Why? One, often these aren’t raced all out and end up underrating a runner. Two, to lessen my workload. I’d rather concentrate on these rankings and use the weekend invites that are more likely to be raced hard to determine the rankings.
• Using the top 75% of races instead of 67%
  • Why? If I’m gonna use fewer overall races from a runner’s resume, I have to make up for it in some way.
• No more individual rankings posted to social media
  • Why? I hate instances where a runner stagnates or falls back over the course of the season and it’s posted for the world to see. I recognize people want to know where they’re ranked, so just having it on the website is a happy medium.
• More writeups focused on the top teams and individuals, rather than just handpicking one each week
  • I’ve found that when it comes toward state time, I know all the numbers and what a kid might run, but have a tough time pointing toward a narrative. Hopefully writing a little recap and what to look forward to will help in that regard. I’ll start the story with three teams/individuals this week, then expand in future weeks.
• Posting these one division at a time
  • If you’ve noticed, I always go Division 4 first, trending towards Division 1. This is done intentionally! Traditional media always focuses on the larger schools. By focusing on the smaller divisions first, they get the love that they might not normally receive. It’ll be Division 4 first this week, then next week I think I’ll have enough stats to start on the Upper Peninsula, so they’ll go first.

Now I need to be serious for a minute. These are for fun. If you don’t like these fun rankings, you don’t need to participate, you don’t need to call me names, talk trash to your fellow competitors, or send rude emails. We good here? Enjoy.

Ann Arbor Pioneer

I should know better. Each year, it’s a question along the lines of “who will replace Emily/Cookie/Sarah/Dudek/Anne” and each year, it’s an answer with someone new. Lydia Bowman is a girl that’s stepped into a prominent role, running in the mid-18’s and grabbing top-5 finishes at Benzie and John Bruder. Lydia, along with her Pioneer teammates will be racing Friday in Spartan Elite, going against a strong field with the likes of Brighton, Northville, and Holland West Ottawa.

Romeo

Missing a few pieces of what they hope to bring forth in the late season but that hasn’t stopped the Bulldogs from racking up wins at Lamplighter, Averill and in the MAC Red.

Brighton

The KLAA can be a brutal conference. Coming off a highly competitive Averill Invite then rolling right into a tri containing a top-5 Northville team. The Bulldogs survived with a victory and now head to Spartan on Friday.

Rank	Girls Team	Region	Score
1	Ann Arbor Pioneer	5	94
2	Romeo	9	192
3	Brighton	4	314
4	Northville	6	349
5	Grand Haven	1	406
6	Holland West Ottawa	1	435
7	Saline	5	441
8	Forest Hills Central	3	442
9	Oxford	8	461
10	Traverse City West	2	490
11	Okemos	2	600
12	Jenison	1	612
13	Walled Lake Northern	7	633
14	Rockford	1	671
15	Portage Central	3	677
16	Traverse City Central	2	697
17	Davison	4	705
18	Utica	8	715
19	Lake Orion	8	755
20	Fraser	9	755
21	Grosse Pointe South	9	779
22	Dexter	4	791
23	Macomb Dakota	9	791
24	Livonia Franklin	6	824
25	Rochester Hills Stoney Creek	9	827
26	Rochester	8	838
27	H.H. Dow	2	899

Northville

Have met the challenges of all competitors thus far, taking home titles at Lamplighter and Bath. But the toughest test might’ve been yesterday’s tri against Brighton and Canton, where the Mustangs eked out wins against two top-10 squads.

Brighton

That tri against Northville was intriguing in the sense that the path toward a state title becomes perfectly clear. Can the Bulldogs establish enough of a gap between their 3^rd-5^th runners and Northville’s to counteract the margin between each of their top two’s. Speaking of those top two’s, Luke Campbell is in the middle of a breakout senior year. Has hovered around 16-flat at Cass Benton when he was typically in the 17’s there last year.

Grand Haven

At a Bredeweg Invite chock full of the West Coast’s best D1/D2 teams, the Bucs attained a fairly clear victory. Of course, Seth Norder did what he had to do in order to win, but it’s the improvement and addition of a few parts that gives the GH team their strength. Plenty of experience and a new addition, Luka Hammond, navigating the mid-16 waters as a true freshman.

Rank	Team	Score	Region
1	Northville	162	6
2	Brighton	258	4
3	Grand Haven	342	1
4	Oxford	355	8
5	Ann Arbor Pioneer	406	5
6	Canton	420	6
7	Walled Lake Northern	420	7
8	Romeo	429	9
9	Macomb Dakota	430	9
10	Kalamazoo Central	439	3
11	White Lake Lakeland	452	7
12	Clarkston	508	8
13	Livonia Churchill	542	6
14	Traverse City Central	625	2
15	Jenison	625	1
16	Utica	628	8
17	Forest Hills Central	683	3
18	Saline	689	5
19	Zeeland West	724	1
20	Lake Orion	753	8
21	East Kentwood	783	3
22	Troy	784	8
23	Dexter	830	4
24	Bay City Western	859	2
25	Howell	868	4
26	Portage Central	879	3
27	Rockford	907	1

GIRLS INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS

Rachel Forsyth

For the ratings, I really don’t pay attention to jamborees. Purely as a fan of the sport, check out her 16:44 at Bedford. Judging by the times, the course ran fair and even in one of the tougher leagues in the state, she gapped the field by two minutes.

Selma Anderson

At MITCA last year, popped into the 17’s for the first time ever and this fall, she’s back for more. 17:52 in her debut at Under the Lights was more than 1.5 minutes faster than her 2022 debut.

Victoria Garces

Continuing the momentum from the late seasons of cross and track. It’s been a win each time out and always by a considerable margin. She’s coming down to Holly on Saturday for her biggest test of the year.

Rank	Grade	Name	Team	Rating	Region
1	12	Rachel Forsyth	Ann Arbor Pioneer	181.6	5
2	12	Selma Anderson	Grand Rapids Ottawa Hills	167.1	3
3	11	Victoria Garces	H.H. Dow	158.8	2
4	12	Jayden Harberts	Macomb Dakota	155.1	9
5	12	Lydia Bowman	Ann Arbor Pioneer	151.3	5
6	10	Emmerson Clor	Romeo	151.1	9
7	11	Cassie Garcia	Northville	150.8	6
8	12	Morgan Brown	Livonia Churchill	149.1	6
9	12	Ella Christensen	Northville	148.4	6
10	11	Mallory Bigelow	Oxford	148.2	8
11	10	Natalia Guaresimo	Romeo	148.1	9
12	11	Lucy Cook	Rochester	147.9	8
13	12	Natalie Mello	Ann Arbor Pioneer	147.0	5
14	11	Violet Hrabovsky	Romeo	146.9	9
15	11	Valerie Beeck	Grand Haven	145.8	1
16	12	Layla Krayem	Livonia Stevenson	145.5	6
17	12	Katie Watkins	H.H. Dow	145.2	2
18	12	Addison Johnson	Utica	143.4	8
19	12	Clara James-Heer	Forest Hills Central	143.2	3
20	12	Carrigan Eberly	Brighton	143.1	4
21	11	Grace Tykocki	Grand Blanc	142.6	4
22	12	Hannah DeRoeck	Lake Orion	142.4	8
23	12	Payton Scheffler	Brownstown Woodhaven	142.1	5
24	12	Sylvia Sanok Dufallo	Ann Arbor Pioneer	141.4	5
25	11	Ava Peters	Livonia Franklin	140.8	6
26	12	Elaina (Laney) Alig	Saline	140.7	5
27	12	Alexis Ball	Traverse City Central	139.7	2
28	10	Leah Corby	Rochester Hills Stoney Creek	139.1	9
29	12	Ella Kirkwood	Traverse City Central	138.7	2
30	10	Addie Birkholz	Holland West Ottawa	137.1	1

BOYS INDIVIDUAL RANKINGS

Brendan Herger

Just chillin’ in this early season. He’s been in the 15’s in each of his three races thus far, one of those at the perennially tough Cass Benton and the other a win at Bath.

Luke Suliman

Consistently hitting around 40 sec. faster than his 2022 versions. Neither of his Bath or Lamplighter performances ended in victory, but he’s right there and has a great opportunity for a major one at Holly this weekend.

Vincent Guaresimo

Two 2^nd’s and a 3^rd, but think of his early season in terms of comparison. 16:26 to 15:52 at Lamplighter and 16:44 to 16:13 at Averill.

Rank	Grade	Name	Team	Rating	Region
1	12	Brendan Herger	Northville	210.7	6
2	12	Luke Suliman	Ann Arbor Skyline	209.3	4
3	12	Vincent Guaresimo	Romeo	209.1	9
4	10	Kyle O’Rourke	Highland-Milford	208.8	7
5	12	Aiden Moore	Battle Creek Lakeview	208.1	3
6	11	Ethan Powell	Northville	207.8	6
7	12	Tyler Donovan	Fraser	207.7	9
8	12	Vishvaa Ravishankar	Troy	206.3	8
9	12	Ty Parker	Walled Lake Northern	206.0	7
10	9	Kamari Ronfeldt	Ann Arbor Pioneer	205.6	5
11	12	Seth Norder	Grand Haven	205.2	1
12	11	Seth Conner	Jenison	205.0	1
13	12	Vincent Peterson Sand	Ann Arbor Pioneer	204.8	5
14	12	Sebastian Ramirez	Royal Oak	204.3	7
15	12	Iain Forrest	Davison	203.9	4
16	12	Brandon Anderson	Dexter	203.5	4
17	12	Noah Selvaraj	Bay City Western	202.7	2
18	12	Pierce Grzymkowski	White Lake Lakeland	202.6	7
19	11	Alexander McArthur	Oxford	202.6	8
20	11	Taye Levenson	Bloomfield Hills	202.6	8
21	12	Eric Overdier	Ann Arbor Pioneer	202.5	5
22	12	Anirudh Krishnan	Plymouth	202.1	6
23	12	Jasper Cane	Kalamazoo Central	201.0	3
24	12	Luke Campbell	Brighton	199.9	4
25	11	Malcolm Speigle	Livonia Churchill	199.7	6
26	12	Evan Rice	Walled Lake Northern	199.7	7
27	12	Connor Clor	Romeo	199.3	9
28	10	Benjamin Hartigan	Northville	199.2	6
29	9	Jack MacGregor	Howell	199.1	4
30	12	Tyler Langley	Brighton	198.6	4