A group of local high school boys runners pass a checkpoint during Wednesday's Rattler Invitational at Arthur Pack Reserve. Sierra Vista Buena won the boys race, anchored by Eric Harasyn's first-place time.

Dean Knuth / Arizona Daily Star

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Right before 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday at Arthur Pack Reserve, clouds rolled in, thunder followed and some rain drizzled on spectators at the Rattler Invitational cross country meet.

It happened almost on cue after Flowing Wells' all-everything runner, Tara Erdmann, crossed the finish line first.

"Tara's in. Now it can start to pour," one fan was overheard as saying.

Nature, it seemed, did not want to interrupt Erdmann's local dominance, an occurrence that is as regular as the sunrise these days.

The reigning Class 5A-II state champion won the race at the 3.1-mile desert course in 19 minutes 57 seconds, a healthy 36 seconds ahead of runner-up Kassidy Rede of Salpointe Catholic.

When Erdmann races against Southern Arizona's best, a first-place finish essentially has become a foregone conclusion for her.

Based on results reported to the Star, Rede is the only runner from Southern Arizona to finish a race ahead of Erdmann since November 2004. It hasn't even been close much of the time.

"She trains very hard and very well, and a lot of other runners aren't as focused or as serious about it as she is. That separates her a lot," said Rede, who actually beat Erdmann head-to-head last month at the Mount Carmel Invitational in San Diego.

"She has a different racing strategy than a lot of people. Some people get intimidated by it because she goes out so fast in the beginning."

The Rattler was no different. At the sound of the gun, Erdmann was already in the lead. The rest of the race was somewhat anticlimactic.

"My training started getting really intense earlier this week, and it helps a lot in meets like this," said Erdmann, who ran through sandy washes on Monday — a preview of the terrain at Arthur Pack.

The trenches offered little trouble to Eric Harasyn, the Sierra Vista Buena star who won the boys race in 16:59. He crossed the finish line without so much as a deep breath after sprinting the final 100 meters.

His top competitors from the 5A Southern Region — Jackson Messer of Salpointe (17:16) and Mountain View's James Schow (17:38) — placed second and third.

"Lately I've been running a much smarter race. I was running a little too fast to start out," Harasyn said. "If I can start slower, I can finish stronger."

His finish spurred Buena to the top spot in the boys team standings with 41 points. Salpointe won the girls team portion with 40 points.