Pepperell’s boys and girls cross country teams knew that they needed a good warm up before facing some tough competition over the next two weeks.

With their team victories over the rest of the Floyd County contingency Thursday afternoon at Georgia Highlands College, the Dragons and Lady Dragons are on the right track.

Jordan Worthey was the boys’ individual winner, turning in a time of 19 minutes, 22 seconds.

Pepperell led with 15 points after sweeping the top five places followed by Coosa (50), Model (87) and Armuchee (182).

The Lady Dragons defeated the teams from Model, Coosa and Armuchee as they had three girls finish in the top ten to earn 34 points. Model was second with 52 points while Coosa had 66 and Armuchee had 69.

“This is a good way for our kids to gauge their competition a little bit,” Pepperell coach Dan Tibbetts said. “I feel good about what they’ve done.”

Next on the schedule are the City-County Invitational on Tuesday and then the Ridge Ferry Invitational on Sept. 24. Both meets will be at Ridge Ferry Park and include Rome High, Darlington and teams from around the Atlanta area.

“We’re really training through these meets trying to get ready for next week and upcoming big meets,” Tibbetts said.

“Of course we love to win but the biggest thing for us right now is trying to get our kids’ times down and they did a great job.”

Model’s Taylor Phillips won the girls’ race with a time of 23:26, 50 seconds ahead of Pepperell’s Anna Beth Leroy, who came in second at 24:16.

Leroy was followed by teammates Brittney Mathis (24:30) and Mikayla Wilson (26:04), and Model’s Alexa Mathis (26:16) to round out the top five.

“I developed a new strategy,” Phillips said. “Get in front while you’re ahead and then no one can catch you when you get tired at the end.”

The sophomore broke out in a big way last season when she won the Region 7-AA.

“As soon as I found out last year that I could do it I promised myself that I would win all four years and keep it up,” Phillips said.

She had “RUN FASTER!” written on her left hand Thursday “for encouragement”.

Worthey didn’t need any help with his drive to finish first. The junior headed out to the front of the pack with a group of his teammates.

“I’m competitive as it is and I can’t stand to lose. That’s the way I go about it,” said Worthey, who is also a start on the Dragons’ wrestling squad.

“Usually, we all stay together and today it showed. We did real good.”

Worthey was followed by fellow Dragons Cameron Walsh (19:42), Dustyn Osbourne (19:51), Cody Minter (19:52) and Nick Williams (19:59).

Coosa’s Hylton Hamilton, who ran neck-and-neck with Worthey a week ago at Georgia Highlands, was sixth overall with a time of 20:10.

NOTE: Complete results from Thursday’s cross country meet were unavailable to publish a list of all runners who competed.