The Ridge boys, led by individual champion Brenden McMahon, kept its streak alive by winning for the fifth straight time, the Pingry girls scored a dominating victory, and Julia Scrudato repeated as champion at Thursday’s Somerset County Championships at Pleasant Valley Park in Bernards Township.

There have been several All-State runners who have toed the line for Ridge at Pleasant Valley Park, but none of them ever run as fast as McMahon did when the junior stopped the clock at 15:52.

McMahon, third last year, finished seven seconds ahead of junior Lukas Disko of Bridgewater-Raritan and broke the Ridge school course record of 15:53 that was set by the great Jackson Barna in 2019. McMahon is now No. 6 all-time on Pleasant Valley’s all-time list. In case you are wondering, the course record of 15:26 was set by Doug Smith of Gill St. Bernard’s at the 2007 Somerset County meet. Could McMahon make a run at that record next year?

McMahon’s victory ignited a 1-6-7-12-16 scoring combination for Ridge, which added up to a winning total of 42. Pingry was second with 65, and Bernards, the Skyland Conference champ, was third with 69.

Ridge’s scorers were McMahon, senior Dmitry Cole,  placing sixth in 16:33, senior Dev Patel, seventh in 16:35, senior Matthew Fukushima, 12th in 16:54, and junior Kaleb Huang, 16th in 17:07. Ridge’s average of 16:36 was just eight seconds off the course record of 16:28 that Ridge ran last year.

By: Jim Lambert