Follmar romps to win in Artichoke run
By Dick Sparrer
Just over a week ago, a stumble cost Alicia Follmar of Saratoga an individual victory in the prestigious Stanford Invitational.

But last weekend, there was no stumble for Follmar, and she ran away from the field to win the title in the girls small school division at the 33rd annual Artichoke Invitational in Half Moon Bay.

Follmar covered the 2.25­mile course in 13:54 to finish 10 seconds ahead of her nearest rival, Katelyn Calvelli of Sir Francis Drake.

Follmar was closing in on leader Lindsey Kirschman of Enterprise of Redding down the home stretch in the Stanford meet a week earlier when she fell to the turf. She managed to get up in time to finish second, but the stumble cost her the victory.

Last Saturday, though, Follmar returned to her winning form in the Artichoke Invitational.

In the girls large school division, Monta Vista ran to a team second behind the efforts of Dana Underwood. The senior standout was sixth overall in 14:25 to lead the Matadors to a second-place finish behind Aptos.

Cupertino's Julianne Hansen finished in the top 10, nailing seventh in 14:28. Teammate Kimberly Chew was 17th in 15:16 with Stacie Boyle 28th in 15:35.

Lynbrook's Aya Wakabayashi rounded out the top 10, running 10th in 15:02.

Los Gatos finished strong in the boys large school division. Freshman Matthew Petrillo was 11th overall in 12:21 to lead the Wildcats to a team fourth. Senior Nathan Young was 21st in 12:32 with Greg Geldman 28th in 12:38, freshman Jimmy Jatho 46th in 12:54 and sophomore Don Gaspar 73rd in 13:23.

Monta Vista junior Jason Yow ran a solid race, clocking 12:00 to finish third overall. Sophomore Scott Russell was 13th in 12:26 with Matt Paquet 31st in 12:45.

In the boys small school finals, Saratoga junior Hari Subramaniam ended up 11th in the boys' field in 12:35. Teammate Steven Surrette, a senior, was 35th in 13:08.

MayC Huang led Lynbrook to the team in the girls large school frosh-soph division. Huang, a freshman, ran 14:52 to finish first in the division. Sophomore Christina Liao was fifth with Christina Liu 14th and Zohreh Akhavan 18th.

Saratoga won the team championship in the boys frosh-soph small school class. Ken Douglas was fourth in 13:13 with Henry Barmeier sixth in 13:22, Robbie Paolini 10th in 13:32 and Scott Surrette 12th in 13:34.

In the girls frosh-soph race, freshman Persia Saffaie of Saratoga was ninth in 16:10.

Grant Kodakura of Monta Vista was fourth in 13:45 and Jason Wang of Lynbrook was seventh in 13:54 in the boys large school freshman race.