Camelia Bell wasn’t sure if she would race in Saturday’s opening cross-country meet in Haines.

The senior trained hard all summer but came down with a sore throat the week before the race, forcing her to miss training. It wasn’t until the day before the race that she decided to race.

“It’s a fun race. I decided that if I miss, it’s okay,” she said.

She managed to beat her personal best by about three minutes, despite her legs feeling a bit stale after battling the illness. She did it thanks to the fitness she had built up during the summer gardening and training for two grueling half-marathons.

Bell helped lead a small but dedicated Haines team of just a dozen or so riders to a powerful Juneau-Douglas team of 70 that dominated the men’s and women’s podiums. Still, Glacier Bears coach Jordan Baumgartner said it was a “great start” to the season, and it wasn’t just the sunny weather that cleared up just before the race started.

“We had a lot of personal bests today. We have a lot of new runners and they were happy with how they did today,” he said.

Bell’s time of 24:40 was ninth place and the fastest girl not from Juneau-Douglas. Technically, the fastest girl Saturday was Ida Meyer in 19:43, who finished fifth at the state championships last year. But Meyer ran in the boys’ division, which her coaches said would give her more competition. Her time was more than a minute faster than Kai Mangaccat, who finished first in the girls’ race in 21:32.

On the boys side, Andrew Hansen led the Glacier Bears, finishing eighth. Hansen said he was pleased with himself because he thought he had the fastest time on the course, 20 seconds, or 19:14. He said it was a challenging course. The 5-kilometer course took competitors from the state fairgrounds parking lot back behind the sandbars to start the race and through the Chilkoot Estates subdivision. The course was dotted with puddles from heavy rain in Haines on Friday and Saturday morning.

“It’s a lot of uphill and a lot of hard downhill, so it’s not very moderate. It’s more extreme,” the senior said.

Hansen said his summer training has been put on hold by his full-time job in Idaho painting houses with his brother-in-law. But he said he hopes his times will continue to improve as the team transitions from longer distances to faster speeds in training.

Hansen showed what he was made of by finishing the race quickly and pulling away from the rival hot on his heels.

“Some guy came up to me and I still had some strength left, so I let my imagination run wild,” he said, adding that his goal for the season was to cut his playing time to about 17 minutes.

Camelia Bell said the right pace also helped her pull away from her rival during the race after a confident start.

“Once I do the first loop, I feel like I can really push myself because I know what to expect and I know what my body is capable of,” she said.

Bell said that despite her strong start, she doesn’t have any specific goals for the season, other than improving her results. She completed the 11-mile Takshanuk Ridge Run this summer, as well as the mountainous 25-kilometer (15-mile) Nifty Fifty in Juneau, which she completed as a birthday run with her mother.

“(My goals for the season) are still up in the air. I’m just living it until I figure out what to do with it,” she said.

This year’s Glacier Bears cross-country team is smaller than usual, but coaches and athletes say it brings an intimacy to practices and competitions. With just eight athletes Saturday and a total team of 12 (plus three high school students who trained), it’s a fraction of Juneau-Douglas’ 80-person squad. The Bears are also without last year’s top runner, Ari’el Godinez-Long, who trained with the team but didn’t race because she said she was burned out.

Baumgartner, who returned as head coach this year after a season off, said the smaller team has some advantages.

“I have a lot more time to spend with them one-on-one, so I think they will benefit more because I can give them more individual attention,” he said. “For the most part, it’s not about winning or placing, they just want to get better.”

The scoring rules for the state championships changed this year, with only the top three runners scoring. That gives even a small team like Haines a chance to qualify as a team, in addition to the individual qualifiers. The regional meet is Sept. 24 in Ketchikan. The state meet is Oct. 5 in Anchorage. At state, Haines competes in the small school division, separate from Juneau.

Team members say that despite significant differences in starting points and goals, there is a sense of common purpose.

“Everyone who is here wants to be here,” Hansen said.

It was also exciting to take part in a competition in a big city.

“It’s nice to be around a lot of people, it makes you feel closer to your team,” Bell said.

Glacier Bears players:

Girls

Camelia Bell – 9th place – 24:40

Anna Bell – 24th place – 29:08

Mary Bell – 28th – 30:04

Willa Stuart – 32nd place – 30:41

Boys

Andrew Hansen – 8th Place – 19:14

TJ Smith – 22nd – 21:07

Will Davis – 40th Place – 23:34

McConnell Robinson – 42nd – 24:08