Molalla HS Cross Country

Hello everyone!
Practice starts tomorrow. We will be meeting M-F at 7pm at the track.
These are considered optional until the 19th because that is the first day of “official” practice on the OSAA calendar. However, I HIGHLY suggest coming as much as you can because our first race is on the 29th and your body would REALLY appreciate some miles before then.

I am excited to see you all. Tell your friends to get signed up. Get your physicals turned in. LET’S GET AFTER IT!!!

An announcement from Coach Sniffen:

After nearly four decades, I am retiring from coaching cross country and track and field. I am truly blessed to have been chosen for this wonderful opportunity. Farewell and thank you.

It has been an unbelievable journey. I’ve had the good fortune to spend the entirety of my cross country and track and field coaching career at only two high schools, Grants Pass and Molalla. Throughout, I’ve been inspired, motivated and supported by a tremendous group of student athletes, coaches, administrators, athletic department staff, booster club volunteers, parents and so many others. Thank you.

From the earliest days at Grants Pass to these final days at Molalla, my overarching coaching goal was to foster opportunities for athletes and coaches to grow and succeed as people. We built our programs on values and principles like strength, determination, resilience, commitment and grit. We preached the need for our athletes to take pride in themselves, their team and teammates, their school and their community. In almost every email or message I wrote, I ended with the phrase, “Aim High, Dream Big.”

Throughout it all, the practices, competitions, camps, summer workouts, team dinners, long bus rides and more, I’ve laughed and cried with our athletes and coaches, witnessed great athletic achievements and observed with joy the growth and maturity of our athletes as they progressed from freshmen to seniors. I also had the privilege of coaching my boys in track and field–an experience I will always remember.

Of course, none of this would have been possible for me without the lifetime of support I have received from Barb Sniffen. Most of you probably know the Marvelous Barbalous. She has been a constant presence at all of our home meets, large and small, usually serving as the clerk of the course. With Barb on board, I knew that all would be smooth sailing during the meet regardless of the weather or technological breakdowns. We are looking forward to finding new adventures during the Spring and Fall of each year. Having Saturdays off once in a while should be a real treat. I look forward to catching up on my grandkids' cross country and track and field meets, basketball, soccer and lacrosse games.

In some ways, coaching is a gift that keeps on giving. I take great pride and joy in following the journeys of former athletes and coaches, through weddings, child births, military service and other careers, athletic successes and so much more. For those of you graduating this year, please keep in touch. Do good things. Do great things.

I wish you all well as you embark on your personal journeys and adventures. Embrace the opportunities that come your way, aim high and always dream big.

Good luck to Coaches Schoenfeld, Roberson, Peterson, Olson, and Terry–fantastic people and coaches. Go Molalla.

With love and gratitude,
Coach Sniffen

Colten has been an absolute treasure to both the XC and TF teams both on and off the course/track.
He is the perfect ambassador for our program as a student and as an athlete. After serving as team captain for both teams for multiple seasons he is going to keep his academic and running journey going at

Colten is part of a small group of boys who put this team on their back when the program needed it most. From a season cancelled and moved because of COVID to forest fires and ice storms. We barely had enough to field a team some years and he kept it going and put the program on his back by recruiting runners to come out and being a positive example at practice. Being able to hold a state placing team trophy his senior year is a testament to the work he put in, all of the future success our program has will be a direct result of the work him and that small core group put in.
As a coach, this is who you want. I am excited to get one more track season with him but this is one of those kids that make you tear up when they leave.

So give Colten a congrats when you see him next, he deserves it. And Colten, thank you for your dedication my friend!

And to OIT you absolutely got the embodiment of a Hustlin’ Owl in this kid. I can’t wait to watch!

- Coach Kenny

Sorry for not having a better picture of the cast, I was clapping and couldn’t get my phone camera out fast enough!
Please go support our Molalla Thespians tomorrow for their last day of “The Bold, The Young, and The Murdered”. It was amazing!
They have put just as much practice and work in as other clubs and sports this year, if not more! They deserve a packed house.
Amazing job to the cast and crew. Thank you for a wonderful show!

squad

State cross country: Molalla boys, Canby's MacKenzie Bigej headline local performances After a year absence, the Molalla boys' cross country team returned to the OSAA 4A cross country state championships on Saturday, Nov. 4, at Lane Community College in Eugene and

Don’t think we forgot about our lone girl competing this year! She was just off getting dried off during the guys race! Congrats to Annalyse Jenson on a 19th place finish at the state championships!

NO HARDWARE NO RIDE HOME!
Boys take 4th at state after being unranked in the preseason polls.
3 of the top 4 teams are from our Tri-Valley Conference.
🤫 🤫

Come on out and scream at us. We run in the strongest district in the state of Oregon at the 4A level. On the boys side there are 3 teams from our conference that are ranked in the top 5 in the entire state. On the girls side there are 3 teams in our conference in the top 9 in the entire state.
We need you to come out and yell for us and cheer us on! This program is growing so much and we are so proud of these athletes. They have prepared HARD and are ready to try and make it to the state meet.

Thank you for all the support this season! It all comes down to this!

Round 2 of pictures from our meet at McIver.

Round 1 of pictures from our meet at McIver.

Check out this article featuring the team!

Colten Strohmeyer and Molalla cross country dropping times and excelling in tough conference When Molalla’s Colten Strohmeyer was in his freshman season of cross country, things looked a bit different.

Knappa Logger Elk Run at Teevin Ranch.
BRINGIN’ HOME THE HARDWARE!!!!

Boys and Girls teams both bringing home 1st place trophies in the 4A division. The Boys also took first out of all divisions with the Girls tying in points for 1st in all divisions. Individual medal winners were Colten Strohmeyer and Otto Terry on the boys side and Anika and Annalyse Jenson on the girls side. I also want to give a HUGE shout out to Brandon Roberson who won the Most Inspirational male runner award at the race because of his ridiculously hard finish passing multiple other racers before collapsing across the finish line, he is an extremely talented Javelin thrower who is doing XC to stay in shape and is still showing up and working just as hard or harder than most.

I know I can speak for myself and Coach Terry when I say that we are so proud of all of these athletes today. It always feels so good to see so much excitement and happiness after great performances across the board. Amazing job!

ON THE ROAD TO STATE 🏃‍♀️

The Molalla girls XC team is going to state for the first time since 2015! It came down to a tie breaker for the conference title and we BARELY got nudged into 2nd. Absolutely amazing performance after starting the season ranked towards the bottom of the conference, they showed the conference that the young team was for real. Congrats to Anika Jenson for winning the individual conference champion medal and to Annalyse Jenson for coming in right behind her in 2nd, both of their efforts making the All-Conference 1st team….. Our guys ran an awesome race too and finished just outside of state qualifying in 3rd place. They ran hard and we had a lot of PRs today. We had a couple Varsity kids go down with sickness and injury and we had some JV kids take the next man up mentality and perform hard. Also, congrats to Otto Terry on making 2nd team All-Conference on the guys side.

Congrats to Anika Jenson on being named OSAA athlete of the week for her amazing performances over the last couple races!

Wilsonville Toyota and the OSAA congratulate Anika Jenson of Molalla Girls Cross Country for being named Athlete of the Week presented by Toyota!

Full details and nominate an athlete: https://www.osaa.org/awards/athlete-of-the-week

DAM Worth It Invitational. Girls team wins the 1st place pumpkin. Boys team wins the 3rd place pumpkin. We even took the girls individual 1st place pumpkin as well. The bus ride home was spooky 🎃 🎃 🎃

Yes that’s right! We get two XC articles/interviews in one day!

Molalla cross country: Anika Jenson fueled by love of the run The freshman harrier finds herself No. 1 in the conference and No. 4 in the state with a desire to continuously grow

We got some love in the paper.

Molalla cross country previews districts at Estacada Invitational On Oct. 12, Molalla's harriers went stride for stride against strong foes at McIver Park

Anika Jenson getting some love!

Three Course challenge in the books. This is one of the toughest courses of the year and everyone ran well.

The is always a good time. It was wetter and cooler than we have been used to but everyone competed well especially given how tough this race is. Also, shout out to Anika Jenson for starting her season 2-0. Two 1st place finishes in her first two high school races ever. Her time at Ultimook put her JUST outside the top 5 all-time list at Molalla High School.

Hoping that a bird crashing into one of our runners on our first tree farm run of the season is a good omen for the rest of the season! Getting pooped on is supposed to be good luck, is this the same? Haha 😁🐥

Also we have an instagram now to share race and practice pics. Follow the team on instagram.