The Zionsville Invite will be held on the same course as the Riverview Health Invitational this year. For the past few years the yearly cross country invite has been held downtown Indianapolis at Graham Martin Park. This change is actually a good one for both the overall meet and those that participate. In recent years the number of teams participating has grown significantly, thus causing the smaller park to not be an ideal location for the meet. The move up north to Carmel should be good for all as the Northview course is host to the Riverview Health Invitational, which boasts well over 1000 athletes, many of which will get a first shot at the course this weekend.
This meet in itself is a unique one, the divisions aren't your typical boy/girl or varsity/jv. Here the meet splits up based on grade level. The freshman and sophomores race together and the junior and seniors race together. This format isn't unique to the Zionsville Invitational, but it isn't a common format for meets throughout the season. Most of the time we see the format of varsity and junior varsity races and maybe every now and then a freshman race is thrown in. So in that case that makes this invite a fun one to even just go see.
This weekends meet will feature 6 of the top 25 ranked girls teams and 7 of the top 25 ranked boys teams, providing high quality competition all around this early in the season. We will be on-site with coverage first thing Saturday morning.
Top Things to Watch at the Invite
We can expect to see the Lady Eagles showing off what that summer work did. They come in as the No. 22 ranked team in the country, per the MileSplit50 rankings, and our preseason No.1 team. This meet will give the incoming freshman a good chance to be seen in a spotlight compared to the traditional JV race. We should also see our first look at Katelyn Wasson, the teams top returner, as well as the other 5 they return from their state runner-up squad from last season.
The Carmel greyhounds, on both the girls and guys sides of things should be two groups that will look really good on Saturday. Both groups come in with great talent. One the girls side, Phoebe Bates will look to lead the Jr/Sr squad. While Michael Moon should lead the boys team.
Bloomington South and Columbus North boys squads will both be very strong teams this season. B-South took 2nd last week at the Valley Kickoff on the state meet course and will look to continue that hot streak this week as well. Columbus North has been putting in some amazing work and is easily a top 15 team in the state and one to watch here as we get one of the first looks at them.
West Lafayette looks to be a team that could win the New Prairie Semi-State on both the girls and guys sides this season and this will be a good first big look for them against some top teams.
Fishers on both the boys and girls side of things as well looks to be a strong team. Saturday will be their first "test" of the season with a 4K to see how the summer training improved any athletes.
The North Central boys team will get their first run against MIC rivals Carmel and Center Grove. Alex Frey should be looking to use the momentum from track season to kick off his season strong as well.
2019 Participating Teams |
| Arsenal Tech |
| Bloomington South |
| Brownsburg (Boys) |
| Carmel |
| Center Grove |
| Columbus East |
| Columbus North (Boys) |
| Fishers |
| Lebanon |
| Herron |
| New Palestine |
| North Central |
| Northview |
| Purdue Poly |
| Rushville |
| Shortridge |
| Terre Haute North |
| West Lafayette |
| Zionsville |
Meet Schedule
8:30am - 9th/10th Boys
9:00am - 9th/10th Girls
9:30am - 11th/12th Boys
10:00am - 11th/12th Girls
Northview 4K Course Map
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