Menu
Wilson excited by Gatorade award
Cub standout rolling along with career
Emma Wilson is not a person to verbally drone on and on about her running successes.
It’s just not in her nature.
“I guess it’s pretty cool,” she said quietly of her numerous accolades.
What is in her nature is to run really long distances faster than anyone in the state of Indiana.
For that item, Wilson added to her lengthy list of awards earlier this month when she received a trophy from Gatorade to recognize her as Indiana’s girls’ cross country “Runner of the Year” for 2017.
“I didn’t know about this award until last year,” she said. “I was pretty excited about it.”
Wilson won the IHSAA cross country state title last fall, but coach Craig Jordan noted the award is not automatically awarded to the winner of that race.
“It’s awesome,” he said. “When you look at the criteria, they also look at academic achievement and exemplary character — and she definitely exhibits both of those.
“She definitely earned and deserved this.”
Track practice started this week, as Wilson seeks to repeat her state titles of last year in the 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs.
Wilson has remained over the winter months, competing in the Nike Cross Nationals at Portland, Ore., in December — finishing 14th to earn All-American honors — and running the nation’s best 1,600-meter time at an indoor Distance Showcase recently at Wabash College.
“She’s still working hard, and she’s still getting better,” said Jordan, a standout runner himself at Calumet and Indianapolis Pike high schools before an excellent career at Butler University. “We haven’t talked about specific goals too much, but she’s just working to keep cutting down her time as much as she can. She’s just trying to keep training and stay healthy.”
Wilson enjoyed her trip to Oregon, and was thrilled to run against the best competition she had ever encountered.
“It was really fun,” he said. “It was super to get to run against people from different states. I wanted to start off the race a little faster, because it was going to be harder to move up during the race. It was a great experience.”
The running conditions were what one might expect for the Northwest in the middle of winter.
“It was muddy,” Wilson said. “It was a nice course, but the guys ran before the girls and they tore it up.”
Wilson is running 50-55 miles a week, going daily most of the time with just occasional rest.
Predictably, colleges have started taking notice of Wilson and her talents.
She has made a couple of visits, but has not made a decision yet.
“I want to stay relatively close to home,” she said. “I’m not sure yet, but I’ll figure it out.”
From her lengthy state tournament experience, Wilson knows the competition will continue to get tougher the farther she advances.
Wilson will more than likely zoom to the front of the pack in her races this spring, and would like to break 10:30 in the 3,200 and maybe in the low 4:50s in the mile.
Wilson has managed to avoid injury problems, and credits that to Jordan’s training program.
“Coach does a good job of helping us stretch and planning the workouts,” she said. “I think I’m still getting better.”