THE GREAT COW RUN: Area harriers off and running at popular early-season cross country race

September 2, 2025

By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X

A staple amongst the Cerritos High cross country program since 2006 once again took place last Saturday morning, on a high school campus with a unique look. But despite the unconventional conditions that one would see at most cross country races, not many were complaining about the annual Great Cow Run.

Four area schools were represented in the prestigious early season event with Norwalk High having the most success as its boys team finished in 12th place out of 24 schools that fielded a complete team and the girls placing 13th out of 21 schools that had the required five runners to officially garner team points.

In 2006, the event was called the Cerritos Cross Country Invitational and after a one-year absence because of construction at Cerritos Regional Park, it was renamed the Great Cow Run even though it has not been held in the City of Cerritos since 2021.

In 2022, it was held on the Artesia High campus and since 2023, it has been held at John Glenn High.

“After working with them to host league meets on their campus, I noticed the potential of a great meet there,” said Cerritos head coach Jason Watanabe. “Plus, Glenn has a great coach in Andy De La Torre and athletic director in Linda Parra, who I work well with. We each do our part to ensure the success of the meet, and it has led to positive feedback among the teams attending. While holding the meet at [Don] Knabe Park again is a wish of our school and many teams who attend our meet, the process for holding the meet at the park is quite difficult and unfeasible for our meet.”

The Norwalk boys racked up 326 points and although the Lancers were 12^th overall, they finished in seventh place with 180 points among a dozen schools classified in the Large Schools Division. Senior Leo Diaz had the fourth best time of all runners at 14:51 while sophomore Juan Mares came in 37^th overall with a time of 15:51.

The next area runner was Whitney High senior Cristian Ishiki (74^th, 16:33) and his teammate, senior Caiden Cortes, finished in 83^rd overall at 16:42. The leading Cerritos runners were senior Isaac Domingo, who came in 109^th overall with a time of 17:01.3, and freshman Krish Kohli, 17:01.5. Whitney would finish in 15^th place overall with 326 points while Cerritos was near the bottom with 596 points. The Glenn boys did not have a runner for this race.

“Overall, it was a positive start for the team at the race,” said Watanabe. “For the boys, our top runner, Vincent Valenzuela, sat out for this race and our top runner was over thirty seconds faster than our top runner last year. Our top finisher on the day improved by over two minutes from last year. While we do have some things to work on, we don’t put too much emphasis on the early season, and hope that they can develop well as we head into October.”

The Norwalk girls had success as well, finishing in 13^th overall (eighth in the large schools division) with 406 team points while Cerritos and Whitney each had three runners, and Glann had a pair of runners. Because of the small numbers, those schools did not have any team points,

Senior Dani Romero of Cerritos was the top area runner, coming in 45^th place with a time of 20:09 while Whitney junior Katherine Low finished 14 places behind Romero overall with a time of 20:26. Romero’s time was her best at the Great Cow Run as she ran a 20:46 in 2023. The top Norwalk runner was senior Daniela Raya Perez (72^nd. 20:56) while her teammate, senior Aaliyah Taylor came in 95^th with a time of 21:31.

The other two Cerritos runners were juniors Nandini Panchal (23:38) and Samantha Gomez (26:29) while the other two Whitney runners were seniors Raphaela Flores (21:37) and Emma Vicencio (22:34). Seniors Melanie Patino (23:09) and Stacy Hernandez (27:06) were the two Glenn participants.

“Like the boys, we got hit with an illness bug on top of a few injuries,” said Watanabe of the girls. “With a busy first two weeks of the season (four races in two weeks), we had two of our varsity athletes out, which made it a little challenging. The majority of our girls didn’t run at the Great Cow Run. We also lost four of our top athletes this season (for various reasons), so having a missing athlete makes it a bit more challenging for the others. Regardless, the girls also have a young and motivated group; we are hoping they’ll improve, and we’ll find some solid athletes by season’s end.”

Cerritos, Glenn and Norwalk will join the other three schools from the 605 League for its first cluster meet on Wednesday at Clark Park while Norwalk is scheduled to be in the Pat Hadley Invitational on Saturday at Tri City Park in Placentia.