BY JON R. LAFOLLETTE | STAFF WRITER
EDINBURG — When Alexandria Cruz crosses the finish line today at Bobby Lackey Stadium, she’ll likely find herself in a situation which has defined her track season — alone.
The Edinburg High senior distance runner is having one of the most dominant statistical seasons in Valley track history. At every meet and every race — be it the 800-meter or 1600-meter runs — Cruz crushes the competition and coasts to an easy victory. Her season-best time in the 800 of 2 minutes, 14.02 seconds is the second-best among girls in the state per Athletic.net, as is her 1600 time of 4:58.02.
When Cruz takes the track, it’s not a question of who will win, but who will come in second and how far behind they’ll finish. At last week’s district meet, Cruz predictably won gold in the mile run, beating the runner-up by nearly 20 seconds. On the surface, it was a good day.
“Everyone told me, ‘Wow that was a really good time. You did such a good job,’” Cruz said. “Actually, that was my slowest time of all season (5:06.74). My coach was pretty upset.”
While nearing the five-minute mark and running away with a first-place finish would elate most of her competitors, for Cruz, it was just “a workout.” The real test begins today when she returns to Bobby Lackey stadium in Weslaco for the Region IV Class 6A area track and field meet. All top-four finishers qualify for regionals next week in San Antonio.
“It’s kind of upsetting,” Cruz said of last week’s disappointing time. “But you know what you have to do to get better and you know what you have to work on.”
During practice, Cruz, who also competes in cross county, hones her skills by running alongside members of the boys team. It’s something she’s been doing since third grade when she outran boys in elementary school. Although smaller than her male peers, her coaches refuse to cut Cruz any slack.
“Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean that I have to hit a slower time,” she said. “I have to hit the same time as the boys. Some of the boys are like, ‘Really, coach, she has to hit that (time)?’”
Running against her male counterparts allows Cruz to simulate the pressure of running at an advanced level, like the kind she’ll face should she qualify for next month’s state meet in Austin.
“She’s never made it so state before,” coach Homer Martinez Jr. said. “It’s hard. Hopefully this is the year. She’s got a real good chance. She’s there, she just has to go out there and do it, and that’s the hard part. When the pressure is on and she’s racing against girls up (north) that can beat her, she just has to stay with them. We’ll see what happens.”
The state meet will be held at the University of Texas, where Cruz signed to compete in cross country and track and hopes to study nursing. While running allowed her to attend the school of her choice, she says the recruiting process was stressful.
“They wanted to know a lot of things about (me) and they wanted to know it now,” Cruz said. “I was recruited during my cross country season, which means I had to race, go to school and make my visits, which was a lot. I missed a lot of school because of that and I was behind on my work. I was like, ‘You know what, I just want to get this over with.’”
Cruz says she received letters from Harvard, Stanford and UCLA, among others. Her first letter came from Hardin-Simmons, a D-III school in Abilene, when she was a freshman.
“I was really happy,” Cruz said. “Someone wanted me to run for them. My coaches said they had a feeling I’d be getting more.”
Cruz says she wanted to attend a college in Texas so as not to be too far away from home.
Martinez Jr. says coaching Cruz is an “honor,” and credits her work ethic and passion to get her from an unpolished freshman into a state-ranked athlete.
“It’s showing now,” he said. “All the hard work is paying off. She’s got a chance to go out there in the 800 and possibly win the regional meet. She never got down on herself all these years. She knows she can compete with anyone if she does her job.”