By: Con Marshall
This year’s Colter Run on Saturday during Fur Trade Days was a popular event. A total of 127 runners finished one of the two distance races, compared to just 86 a year ago. This year’s contestants came from 14 states.
The winners of both 5 kilometer races are from Chadron. Drew Pope won the men’s race, finishing ahead of Andre Ditsch of Bee Cove, Texas, and Kim Dolatta was the women’s first place finisher, beating Haley Bidroski of Gordon by 20 seconds. Third place among the women was Gracie Calkins, who will be a sophomore at Chadron High this fall.
Nick Kizzire of Alliance won the men’s 10 K race for the second year in a row and improved his winning time by 75 seconds. He’s the cross country coach at Alliance High and finished one place ahead of his team’s best runner, Trevor Zurn. Dylan Stansbury of Crawford, who won the 10K event six times in a row through 2021, finished third this year.
Lydia Peters of Sidney, a distance runner at Chadron State College, won the women’s race, edging Kyndall Carnahan of Chadron, who also runs for the Eagles, by seven seconds. Carnahan won last year’s 10K race. Her time was two minutes faster this year.