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All things considered, between the overnight travel, the muddy, challenging course and the thought of the homecoming dance back home, Steamboat Springs cross-country coach Glen Light was pleased with the Sailors' performance at the Chris Severy Cross Country Invitational Saturday in Aspen.

"They did as well as I've ever seen us do in Aspen," Light said. "It's probably the hardest course we run. There was only about 200 meters of it on level ground."

On the boys side, Steamboat came in fifth out of 16 teams. Durango took first place, Moffat County took second and Aspen took third.

Aspen's Noah Hoffman, winner of Steamboat's Sept. 9 Invitational, ran away with the winning individual time of 17 minutes, 36 seconds.

"If there was ever a course tailor-made for Noah, this is it," Aspen coach Chris Keleher said.

Light said that the hilly course was an "old-school, European-style" course on which some of his athletes thrived and others struggled.

Matt Hill lead the way for the Sailors, finishing in 18:54, sixth out of 101 runners. Other Steamboat finishers included Charlie Stoddard (18th), Sam Chovan (33rd), Lee Wren (43rd) and Bryce Gordon (47th).

The girls team finished seventh out of 14 teams. Glenwood Springs won ahead of Durango and third-place finisher Summit.

Rachael Caires (23rd) and Brittany Long (25th), running in her first race of the season, were Steamboat's top finishers out of 80 runners. Alyssa Walter (33rd), Anna Anderson (47th) and Courtney Adamo (65th) also scored for the Sailors.

The team will taper their training to prepare for Saturday's meet at Battle Mountain, which will be a precursor to the following week's regional meet on the same course.