"It felt good; the mud was awesome," Riggs said. "I felt like I jumped in a pool and then ran."
Riggs sloshed through the mud to bring home a third-place finish at the District 5-5A cross country meet at the University of North Texas in Denton. She finished the two-mile course in 12:29. Colleyville's Alyssa Nielson won the race in 11:57.
Riggs' finish led the Northwest Lady Texans to a third-place finish. They finished with 64 points to earn a trip to the 5A Region I meet in Lubbock Nov. 7. Grapevine won the district with 55 points. Keller was second, scoring 58.
"It's a tough district," said Northwest coach George Lutkenhaus. "All the teams run the same way. Grapevine and Keller did a good job of getting their runners packed together."
Through the first half mile, Riggs was fourth. She was then able to work her way into second. She said she was unable to hold off Grapevine's Sarah Sattler in the final quarter for second.
"As soon as I passed the mile point, I got tired," Riggs said. "I was second until I got to the last 400."
Lutkenhaus said the freshman ran a solid race.
"She ran as good as she could have on a day like today," he said.
Jasmine Boutte finished 10th in 13:07. Malisa Lewis ran 13:14 to finish 13th. Caren Stuebe took 15th in 13:23. Northwest's fifth runner was Chelsea Reza, who finished 23rd in 13:46. Cooper Mitchell ran 13:57, taking 27th. Chynna Hart took 38th in 14:31.
