“FRESNO — When La Jolla’s Chiara Dailey wants to make a statement, look out.

Jumping into the lead from the start, the Vikings junior ran a time of 16 minutes, 44.9 seconds, winning by a whopping 49 seconds, to defend her Division 4 title in the State Cross Country Championships Saturday at Woodward Park’s 3-mile course.

“Nobody (previewing the meet) gave me any credit, so I wanted to run the fastest time in the state to show I belonged,” she said. “All I wanted was something faster than 17:46.5 (the winning time by Corona Santiago’s Rylee Blade in Division 1). Doing it all by myself was difficult. If I had Rylee, Sadie (Engelhardt) and Holly (Barker), it would have been easier.”

Blade, Ventura’s Engelhardt (the Division 2 champion) and Trabuco Hills’ Barker (second in Division 1) are all veteran runners who might have been able to stay with Dailey, at least early. But Dailey led her race by 14 seconds at the mile, opened it up to 37 seconds after 2 miles and finished 49.3 seconds ahead of JSerra’s Chloe Elbaz in second. That was the biggest margin all day — boys or girls.

“I went for it,” said Dailey, who won the section title two weeks ago despite being ill. “Now, I want to do it again at the Foot Locker West Regionals next week (at Mt. SAC) and the Nationals (in San Diego) the week after that…” 

Article and photo provided by The San Diego Union-Tribune. Read the full article here.