Northwood junior Bethan Knights and El Toro senior Juan Gonzalez closed out their respective seasons by competing at the 2012 Nike Cross Country Nationals Saturday at Portland Meadows Race Track in Portland, Oregon.

Knights, who was the Division 3 runner-up at the state meet, was 43rd in Saturday’s race, clocking a time of 20:37 on the 5k (3.1 mile) course.

Simi Valley junior standout Sarah Baxter won her second straight individual title in a time of 19:17.

Fayetteville-Manlius High of New York won the team title for the seventh straight season. The Stotans (54 points) had five scoring runners place in the top 20 and easily out-distanced second place Carroll High of Corpus Christi, Texas who was second with 198.
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El Toro senior Juan Gonzalez and Northwood junior Bethan Knights are among  10 runners that are scheduled to compete for California as individuals at the 2012 Nike Cross Country Nationals  Saturday at Portland Meadows Race Track in Portland, Oregon.

Gonzalez capped his CIF season by winning the Division 1 state title last weekend in Fresno in a photo finish over Arcadia junior Estevan De La Rosa. Gonzalez (15:04.8) had the fastest overall time of the meet amongst all runners in all five divisions.

Also competing as individuals are Dos Pueblos junior Bryan Fernandez, Vista Murrieta senior Porter Reddish, Saugus senior A.J. Yarnall, and Ramona senior Forrest Riley.

Knights finished second in Division 3 at the state meet final and had the county’s fastest overall time (17:49).

Other individual runners scheduled to compete from California include: Simi Valley junior Sarah Baxter, Beverly Hills senior Sydney Segal, Buchanan senior Hagen Reedy, and Granite Bay freshman Maggie Bell.

The girls championship race is scheduled to begin at 10:05 a.m., with the boys championship race scheduled to start at 11:35 a.m.