Kromer, Immel lead NMS teams to top five at Carnival

TIFFIN — The Norwalk Middle School cross country teams competed in the Tiffin Carnival on Sept. 11 at Hedges-Boyer Park. The girls team placed fifth in the 26-team field. The Truckers were led by Xavi Immel, who won the Division I-II race that had 183 runners in a time of 12:14. The time broke her sister's record, current freshman runner Zuri Immel, that she set last season. Also for the NMS girls, Kayli Bergman finished 34th in 14:01 and Isabel Ott (14:15) was 38th. Taryn Temple was 60th (14:50), followed by Maddison Trenor (15:05) in 72nd, Amira Turner (15:28) in 89th and Sarah Hart (16:56) in 144th. The NMS boys team placed fourth in its 27-team field. Casey Kromer took second out of 182 runners in the Div. I-II race with a time of 10:54, just a half-second off the winning time. Kromer's time also set a new program record held by his brother, senior runner Kyler Kromer, set back in 2017. Also for the boys, Kingston Gonzales placed 24th in 12:04). He was followed by Alex Christophel in 37th (12:21); Landon Knoll in 39th (12:22) and Jake Bissell in 40th (12:23) to round out the top five in scoring. Also running the race was Taylen Biddinger in 55th (12:40), Anthony Hall in 78th (13:16) and Roman Snyder (13:14). Norwalk is scheduled to compete in another big weekend race on Saturday at the Galion Festival.