A first-year meet on South Florida's most-raced course, a 5 p.m. start in late-August Miami, and a girls' race where the two favorites finished one point apart at Cecil Field. Only two of the 65 entries have raced in 2026.
Preview: Superfly Invitational #1 Presented by Fleet Feet Miami — Friday, August 28, Larry & Penny Thompson Park, Miami. Hosted by Miami Elite Track Club. Girls 5K at 5:00 p.m., boys 5K at 5:40, middle school and elementary two-mile at 6:15. Sixty-five team entries — 33 girls', 32 boys'.
A first-year meet, entered by school rather than by athlete, on a course that has never raced in August. Only two of the 65 entries — Lourdes and St. Thomas Aquinas — have run a scored meet in 2026. Everyone else is read off the five championship races run on this exact ground last fall, graduates struck — and that is order, not prediction, because nobody runs November times at five o'clock in late-August Miami.
Girls: one point apart, and the only real racing anyone has done
The only 2026 evidence in this field is also the best story in it. Lourdes and St. Thomas Aquinas both ran the Cecil Field Summer Classic on August 21. Score that race as a dual meet, no conversions, and this is what Friday is a rematch of:
| Athlete | Team | Time | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Elise Brown (So.) | St. Thomas Aquinas | 18:50.0 |
| 2 | Kendall Parrott (So.) | St. Thomas Aquinas | 19:16.0 |
| 3 | Sofia Jimenez (So.) | Lourdes | 19:21.0 |
| 4 | Alessandra Perez (Sr.) | Lourdes | 19:43.0 |
| 5 | Marisa Mantecon (So.) | Lourdes | 19:52.0 |
| 6 | Charlotte Lee (Jr.) | St. Thomas Aquinas | 20:17.0 |
| 7 | Ava Barrera (Jr.) | Lourdes | 20:50.0 |
| 8 | Emilia Volz (Jr.) | Lourdes | 21:06.0 |
| 9 | Caoimhe McConville (Jr.) | St. Thomas Aquinas | 21:21.0 |
| 10 | Taylor Gold (Jr.) | St. Thomas Aquinas | 21:25.0 |
Lourdes 27, St. Thomas Aquinas 28 — and Lourdes took the sixth runner too. Aquinas owns the front of the race, Lourdes owns third through eighth, and it is the oldest shape in the sport. These are ranked programs: Lourdes is eighth in our statewide girls team rankings, Aquinas is fourth in our 4A girls team rankings, and Sofia Jimenez was the biggest mover on our 3A girls list. Friday settles on a finish line what those lists could only estimate through course math.
Two swing pieces. Elise Brown's 18:50.0 was a 92-second improvement on her mark on this course last fall — the largest by any of the fifteen athletes in this field with a time at both meets, and the largest by any girl inside our top 120 returners statewide. And Kendall Parrott did not run on this course at all last fall, so the course history undercounts Aquinas exactly one runner's worth; she is the name most likely to break the rematch open.
The rest of the field is priced off last fall here, and it agrees: Lourdes over Aquinas, 40–49, with Braddock third at 69 — the field's most complete returning group, every one of last November's top six back behind seniors Samantha Lompar (20:03.0) and Madison Chin (20:38.5), but almost three minutes a runner off the two favorites on 2026 form. Coral Reef's returners rescore fourth. Mater Academy is fifth on two scorers who are still in middle school — Natalia Moreno and Destinee Guido, both of whom scored at a district championship last fall, and both eligible. Coral Shores brings Ali Wheatley (Jr., 20:22.5), the 2A District 8 runner-up, and a 2:55 gap behind her.
Boys: Aquinas has raced, Coral Reef hasn't needed to
Zack Nonez (Jr.) ran 17:53.0 at Cecil Field — the fastest 2026 mark by any boy entered — and Aquinas went 19:26, 19:29, 19:29, 19:34 behind him, a 19:10.2 average. Put every boys' team on 2026 evidence and only two can be scored at all: Aquinas 23, Coral Reef 37, with Coral Reef entered on a projection that credits them with no summer whatsoever.
Coral Reef's case is who comes back. All five scorers from an 18:43.6 course average return, 86 seconds apart front to back — Lucas Marchesan (So., 18:10.3), Lucas Chavez (Jr., 18:17.3), Aiden Williams (Sr., 18:28.2), Yuta Akiyama (Jr.) and Julian Gonzalez-Hernandez (So.) — and rescore the returning field over this course and they win by 53 points over Miami Palmetto, whose Hector Brown (Sr., 18:13.0) and Ryder Kelly (So., 18:38.5) are a better one-two with a 90-second hole behind it. The honest read: Aquinas replaced a graduating pack with underclassmen who have already raced well, and Coral Reef didn't have to replace anybody — but hasn't been seen since November. Coral Reef is the pick, and it is not a confident one.
Two wildcards. Hialeah Gardens seniors Dicarlos Dias (17:40.5) and Braden Baute (17:41.8) are the two fastest returners on the course, 1.3 seconds apart, with their team's next man at 22:14 — a lead-group pair on an eighth-place team. And Braddock owns the four fastest returning marks here — Ian Vicente (So., 17:01.6), Lucas Knight (Jr., 17:08.3), Jacob Castanedo (Sr., 17:16.1), Jaeden Liranzo (Sr., 17:27.1) — and graduated everyone else who scored. A fifth in the 18s wins them this meet by a distance; no fifth, and they may not score.
Behind those names, the returning-course order runs Homestead, Miami Southridge, Somerset Academy (PP), Mourning, American, Hialeah Gardens, Reagan, Miami Coral Park, Miami Beach, Miami Norland.
What's still dark
This is the largest unknown share of any field we have previewed this season: nineteen of the 32 boys' entries and 21 of the 33 girls' entries cannot field a scoring five off anything we can see — no returning five on this course and no 2026 result. Coral Gables' girls are the sharpest illustration of what graduation did here: they won the 305 Classic, finished third at the region meet, and return exactly one runner — Lola Mcdanal, 23:38.8. Homestead's girls return one. Hialeah Gardens' girls return one. Braddock's boys return four, Coral Gables' and Aquinas' boys four each, and six boys' entries plus eight girls' entries have no 2025 mark on this course at all.
Names that are not what they look like. Mater Academy is the Hialeah Gardens school, 3A — not Mater Lakes, not Mater Bay. American is American Senior of Hialeah, not American Heritage. Somerset Academy (PP) is the Pembroke Pines campus. Coral Shores is in the Keys, girls only. Dr. Krop is Michael Krop; Goleman is Barbara Goleman, girls only. And St. Thomas the Apostle is a Catholic K-8 in South Miami, almost certainly headed for the 6:15 two-mile rather than the 5K.
Notes on the numbers
Why nothing was converted through this course. Sixty-nine athletes ran both Larry & Penny Thompson and the 2025 state meet, and their times disagree by 44 seconds for boys and 68 for girls depending on which race you sample — the checkpoint even disagrees on direction, with the four Aquinas boys who ran both here and Cecil coming out 47.3 seconds slower in August and the eleven Lourdes and Aquinas girls coming out roughly half a minute faster. So the November rescore stays on this ground, the 2026 scoring applies one uniform adjustment that cannot change the order, and a November number is never compared to a 2026 number. We also rescored the returning field on district-only marks and on each runner's last race here: nothing outside boys' third-through-fifth moves. One roster note: Kendall Parrott ran 19:16.0 at Cecil and holds a 19:54.4 state time, but missed the region meet here — which is why she counts in the 2026 scoring and not in the course history.
This is one of three meets we previewed this week — the Whispering Pines Invitational in Inverness and the Kowboy XC Invitational in Kissimmee both run Saturday morning. Our week-two rankings will move on all three.
Frequently Asked Questions
When and where is the Superfly Invitational? expand_more
Friday, August 28, 2026 at Larry & Penny Thompson Park, 12451 SW 184th St., Miami, hosted by Miami Elite Track Club. The girls' 5K goes at 5:00 p.m., the boys' 5K at 5:40, and a middle school and elementary two-mile at 6:15.
Who is favored at the Superfly Invitational? expand_more
On the girls' side, Lourdes — over St. Thomas Aquinas by nine points on last November's course results and by a single point on 2026 form. On the boys' side the two readings disagree: Coral Reef returns all five scorers from an 18:43 course average, while Aquinas has the best 2026 evidence. Coral Reef is the pick, and it is not a confident one.
Which teams have actually raced in 2026? expand_more
Only two of the 65 entries: Lourdes and St. Thomas Aquinas, who both ran the Cecil Field Summer Classic on August 21. Scored head to head there, Lourdes beat Aquinas 27-28. Every other team in the field is being judged on last November.
Why aren't the November times converted to predictions? expand_more
Sixty-nine athletes ran both this course and the 2025 state meet, and their times disagree by 44 seconds for boys and 68 for girls depending on which race you sample. A course that unstable cannot be converted through, so the preview is presented as order, not predicted times — nobody is running November times at 5 p.m. in late-August Miami.