Nine schools, one promising middle school picture
The season-best lists show talent spread across the area, with ten boys under 13 minutes and a young East Muskingum girls group near the front.
Results through September 5, 2026. Published September 7.
Nine local programs have runners among the area's middle-school leaders.
The boys and girls top tens show how widely the early-season talent is spread. Each runner appears with a season best and the date of that race.
Barnesville, Buckeye Trail, Caldwell, Cambridge, Claymont, Garaway, Indian Valley, John Glenn’s East Muskingum middle school program and Shenandoah all have runners represented. The talent is spread well beyond a single team.
Ten boys under 13 minutes
Buckeye Trail eighth-grader Emmett Taylor leads the boys list with his 12:00.0 at Marietta/Broughton on August 29. He followed with a runner-up 12:23 at Newcomerstown.
Indian Valley’s TJ Linerode follows at 12:06.36, with Caldwell’s Conner Wilson at 12:12.0. Shenandoah’s Bennett Hendershot has a 12:24.00 mark and Indian Valley’s Todd Fillman a 12:25.08. The list reaches Garaway’s Miles Yoder at 12:58.0 in tenth.
All ten leading boys are eighth-graders, giving several local high-school programs a promising group approaching the next level. The move to 5K racing will bring a new test next fall.
The middle-school lists include two-mile and 3,200-meter races, with the original distance shown beside each mark.
Garaway leads; East Muskingum has numbers near the front
Garaway eighth-grader Bristol Angel leads the girls’ list with 14:25.0 at Claymont. East Muskingum occupies the next three places: seventh-grader Olivia Townsend at 15:07.40, eighth-grader Nora Burdette at 15:08.64 and seventh-grader Chloe Wilkinson at 15:17.08.
Townsend, Burdette and Wilkinson's season bests are less than ten seconds apart, giving East Muskingum three girls close to the area's early-season lead.
There is seventh-grade talent elsewhere, too. Barnesville’s Maya Stephen has a 15:26 mark and Cambridge’s Ivy Williams a 15:33. Cambridge eighth-grader Sophie Callahan sits between them at 15:27. The girls’ list gives several programs—and several younger runners—a reason to look forward.
Correction, September 13: Ivy Williams ran 15:33 at Claymont, rather than the 15:50 previously stated here. The rest of this article reflects results through September 5.
More races ahead
New races can bring new names into the boys' list and girls' list. The season pages follow each athlete's results, giving readers a way to track those changes across the autumn.
The coming invitationals will bring more chances for the area's leaders to race strong opponents from around Ohio.
Nine programs already have runners among the area's leaders, and several of the leading girls are only in seventh grade. That is a promising start for local distance running.