ELLSWORTH – The first cross country meet of the season was a comeback of sorts for one individual champion. For the other, it was brand new territory.

Ellsworth senior Steven DeWitt looked none the worse for wear in his first high school running event since last fall as he ran through the 2.96-mile Ellsworth Invitational course on a hazy, humid Saturday afternoon in 14 minutes, 17 seconds – just 15 seconds off his course record time set a year ago – and breezed to his second straight invidual boys title.

Earlier in the afternoon, Hampden Academy junior Oriana Farley also easily bested the rest of the field as she won her first individual girls title with a time of 17:43 and led her Broncos to the school’s second straight Ellsworth Invitational girls team title. Hampden placed five runners in the top 16 to outdistance runnerup Sanford 44 points to 72.

On the boys side, DeWitt’s finish wasn’t enough to help his Eagles overcome Caribou’s juggernaut boys program as two Vikings came in right behind DeWitt to lead Caribou to its second straight Ellsworth Invitational title with a 31-point margin over the runnerup Eagles.

The team loss failed to deflate DeWitt. After a basketball midseason knee (tendon) injury caused him to miss all of his spring track season and sharply limited his offseason running regimen, DeWitt was downright delighted.

“I’d like to think I’m back 90, 95 percent with me and 80 percent with my knee, but this is a big confidence booster today,” DeWitt said. “I’m really happy today because I got no miles this summer. I’ve been through a lot of adversity the better part of the last year.”

Ellsworth coach Andy Beardsley said Saturday’s positives outweighed any negatives.

“Hearing him say he felt really good at the end is definitely a positive sign,” said Ellsworth coach Andy Beardsley. “Besides, Caribou looks very strong. They’re returning basically their whole squad and they won handily last year.”

Speaking of handily, the senior-laden Vikings appear to have plenty of talent in reserve as their JV team won the JV boys meet with a perfect score of 15.

“We did that two or three times last year I think, which is good because the great thing about having a great JV team is they kind of pressure the varsity kids all the time and because of that, we treat both teams the same,” said Vikes coach Roy Alden, who has two sons on the team.

Jeff Alden finished second with a time of 14:43 in the varsity race and Kyle Alden was second in the JV meet in 16:58.

“I started out pretty good, but I kinda fell apart a little bit in the middle when I lost DeWitt,” Jeff Alden said. “I knew he’d be strong even though he’d had to take it easy, and he’s only gonna get stronger.”

Chris Blackstone was behind Alden in third, Anthony Hessert was 18th, Sam Sjostedt 22nd, and Matt Salch 29th for the Vikes.

DeWitt, an aspiring architect who has great designs on a comeback, altered his usual strategy of hanging back early on and attacking the leaders down the stretch.

“I went out a little fast to catch him and he stuck with me for the first mile and a half,” he said. “That was my strategy to break him early since he probably thought I was laid up with my injury.”

Farley, a 16-year-old who’s literally been running for half her life, finished 17 seconds ahead of Brewer’s Heather Clark.

“I was third my freshman year, second last year, and now I’m first,” said Farley. “It’s a great course. It’s pretty short, it’s flat, and there’s only one rise in the woods. It’s my favorite.”

Farley contributes on and off the course as she’s also the author of the Broncos’ unofficial motto printed on the backs of their T-shirts: ‘We’re the fast girls your mama warned you about.’

“I did,” she said, giggling. “We were just messing around one day and I said it. I don’t even know why it came out of my mouth. Then someone said ‘We should put that on a T-shirt,’ so they did.”

Amelia Potvin was sixth, Molly Balentine ninth, Mackenzie Rawcliffe 12th, and Shelly Estes 16th to round out Hampden’s top five.

Despite heavy showers all morning and through most of the first JV race, the invitational drew 23 teams and almost 400 runners.

“It’s definitely worth the trip, which I kind of like because the kids have time to talk and really get to know each other,” said Sanford coach Matt Ferry, whose team bus hit the road at 6:15 a.m. “It’s a class meet they do a fabulous job on, the awards are great, and so is the competition.”