They kiddingly called themselves "The A team" even though they have competed as a relay team just twice this track season.

Hey, it's hard to argue with results.

The Bentworth High School quartet of Colton Korpus, Anthony Zigerelli, and the Hubbell twins, Chase and Chad, won the 1,600-meter relay with a solid time of 3 minutes, 29.6 seconds in the final race of the day at the WPIAL Class AA track championships Tuesday at South Side Beaver High in Hookstown.

Their second effort as a group was, well, golden.

"We don't usually do it together because we're all doing other events at a meet. We always run our B or C team," said Zigerelli, a junior who ran the second leg. "The first time we ran it together was last week [at the qualifiers]."

The "A team" did pretty well its first time out. The relay ran a 3:31.8, which was the second-best qualifying time for the event behind Apollo-Ridge's 3:31.3.

When asked if he was surprised by the relay's success Bentworth coach Jerome Nixon said, "No." That's because Nixon had a good idea of how fast each individual on the relay could cover 400 meters.

"It's the best group of 400 runners I've ever had," he said. "And they're all good athletes, which is why we had them doing other events at meets.

"We don't have that many athletes, so we needed those guys in other places. We decided to go after the section title, which we won. We were undefeated in dual meets and lost to Southmoreland in the team playoffs."

This isn't the first time Bentworth has had success in the 1,600 relay. The Hubbell twins and Zigerelli were on the relay team last year when it placed sixth at the WPIAL championships and earned a trip to the PIAA meet at Shippensburg University.

The secret to the relay's success is that three of the runners -- Zigerelli and both Hubbells -- run the 400 in the 51-second range. Korpus, a sophomore and a lineman in football, is the slowest of the four at 54.9, which still isn't bad.

Zigerelli is the fastest and placed fifth in the open 400 in 51.84 seconds. But he runs the second leg, which is interesting. Usually the fastest guy is the anchor man for a relay team.

"We do it so I can make up any deficit," Zigerelli said. "When I got the baton, we were last, but when I handed it off we were first."

Chad Hubbell, a senior who placed third in the 300 intermediate hurdles and fourth in the 110-meter hurdles, ran an outstanding anchor leg, extending the lead he was give by his brother Chase. Chad held off Rochester's runner down the stretch.

The Bearcats' 3,200-meter relay team placed fifth and also qualified for the PIAA championships.

What's also interesting is that Bentworth has a track team, but no track. Some workouts are done on roads and sidewalks around the school, and on a couple nearby hills.

"There are a couple grassy hills at the school and I use those for hill workouts," Nixon said.

Plus, the Bearcats go to Chartiers-Houston on Saturdays and get in some work on the Bucs' track.

"That's usually the only time I can work on the hurdles," Chad Hubbell said. "We have some of the hardest workouts around."

With some of the more impressive results.