Austin Streit of Mounds View Class of 2019
Personal Records
800m - 2:01.28
1600m - 4:22.43
2400m (xc) - 9:40.50
2500m (xc) - 9:46.90
3200m (xc) - 10:47.50
3200m - 9:41.84
2 Mile (xc) - 10:01.00
5K (xc) - 16:00.30
XC State 2017 - 14th place (All-State)
XC State 2016 - 52nd place
Where were you born, and what sports did you play growing up?
I was born in Maplewood Minnesota. I grew up playing a lot of basketball and baseball during my elementary and middle school days and I really enjoyed them but I eventually ended up quitting baseball in 7th grade because it got too boring for me. After my freshman basketball season I decided that running was more important so I quit basketball in order to run year round.
How many letters have you earned in high school?
I have ran cross country since my freshman year and track since 8th grade. I have received 3 letters in cross country and 2 letters in track and I am looking forward to adding another track letter in this coming spring.
Would you give us a play-by-play of the Section 5AA Meet?
Before the race I know that our team wasn't extremely nervous about if the team would make it to State or not, but we were all a little anxious to get a personal best because many of us hadn't had a great race yet this year. The weather conditions were not ideal with it being 44 degrees and 15-20 mph winds so our top 4 decided to go out behind the big front pack through the first and second miles and conserve our energy. Our 3rd and 4th runners eventually fell off of the front pack but my teammate Lukas Hessini and I were able to stay with them through most of the race. At around 4200 meters, Ben Olson from Blaine started to pick up the pace significantly. Both he and I were comfortably sitting in the front pack so when he decided to push the pace I went with him. At the end of the race I couldn't quite catch him but I got second place by one second and our second runner Lukas was only 2 seconds behind me. Overall it was our best race as a team and all of our varsity runners ran their fastest times of the year.
How did things go at the extremely tough Suburban East Conference Meet the week before sections?
At our conference meet I went into the race knowing that there were a couple of really fast runners and with it being a fast course I knew that they might go out a little hard. Three individuals ended up breaking off at a very fast pace within the first mile and I decided to stay with the chase pack and see who would fall back to me. I ended up running in 4th place for most of the race and catching Charlie Babcock of Forest Lake at the very end to get third place. Acer Iverson from Roseville and Addison Stansbury from Stillwater were the individuals in front of me.
Did you win any cross country races this season?
I won the Rum River invitational in the 90 degree heat, so that was definitely a very interesting race. I decided to gap the rest of the field after the mile and take the rest of the race on my own and it worked out pretty well. I have not won any other races this season.
Who among Mounds View runners of the past inspired you?
Specific past Mounds View runners that inspire me are Alex Plasencia and Jeff Taylor. Alex Plasencia was a senior captain when I was a freshman and was one of the toughest runners I've ever met. He now runs for his dad at the University of Minnesota and is having a great season. Another Mounds View runner that inspires me is Jeff Taylor because he holds most of the distance records for Mounds View track. His records inspire me to run faster and do what I can to break them or get as close as I can to them.
How has your training change over the years?
Going into my sophomore year over the summer I ran about 400 miles and I had a really good season dropping over a minute off of my personal best from my freshman year. That summer consisted of mostly slower miles with not much speed work. But coming into this most recent summer I worked some more tempo runs into the training for some speed and ended up over 410 miles. I wanted to keep it similar to last year because it worked so well last year. I've noticed that I really enjoyed the tempos and felt like they were helping me a lot more than a normal or longer run.
What is the biggest mistake you see beginning runners make?
The biggest mistake I see younger less experienced runners make is not using all of their energy throughout the race and having too much energy left at the end. You can always tell when a kid makes this mistake because they end up sprinting three times faster than their race pace in the last 50 meters. My advice to them is to push yourself during the race and to realize that everybody else racing around you is going through the same thing you're going through. Also the faster you run, the quicker you get it over with.
What is your favorite workout?
My favorite workouts are 400m repeats and 800m repeats. I always feel so good during 400s and I feel like 800s are very beneficial for cross country in general. We do 800s very often on our team and 400s every so often.
Does your team do any sprint workouts?
We don't do many of the really short speed workouts on our team but we do accels and stride outs often and hill sprints sometimes throughout the season. We do a couple of fartleks and our most recent one was a 10 minute warm up and 10 minute cool down with a cycle of...
- 4 minutes on (tempo pace)
- 2 minutes off (still under 7 minutes)
- 3 minutes on
- 1 ½ minutes off
- 2 minutes on
- 1 minute off
- 1 minute on
Then the cycle is repeated however long we need to go with 3 minute recovery in between cycles.
Do you follow any professional athletes?
I like any professional Minnesota athletes because I was raised to cheer for Minnesota's teams so I have always done that. Specifically Andrew Wiggens and Joe Mauer would be a couple of my favorites.
What kind of spikes do you wear?
My spikes right now are Nike Zoom Victory 2s and I have always worn nike spikes ever since I started running. I typically use the lighter spikes that they make because they work for me and I am always comfortable in them. I use them for track and cross country and they work very well for both.
What is your diet like?
Our head coach Ross Fleming is also a health teacher so he always tells us that our diet has a big effect on our running performance. So during the season I am very careful about what I eat and I make sure to avoid processed sugar when I can. When it comes to the days before a meet, my diet becomes even more important so I make sure to eat well and give myself the best opportunity to perform well. Coach Fleming also tells us to stay hydrated leading up to a race so I make sure to drink plenty of water in the days before the meet.
How do you plan your race strategy?
I had not had the best races this season until the section meet so not many teams had tried any interesting strategies on me, but I always have a different strategy for every race based on the course and competition. Sometimes I may want to take the lead early and other times I may wait on the chase pack and move up throughout the race.
Overall if you compare my first mile to other runner's that run around 16:00 minutes, mine is much slower so I definitely go out more conservative and get closer to an even split than most people. I've learned that my best times come when I go through the mile at around 5:05, relax on the second mile, and then have another fast mile on the third mile. I've never tried to go out super hard in a race but that may be something I can experiment with in the future.
Our team has always been a pack running team under coach Fleming and this year in our races our first through fourth men have packed together and our fifth and sixth runners have stayed together. Having another teammate or two there to push you during the race is definitely motivating and my goal, being the front of our pack, is to pull my teammates with me and motivate them to run faster.
Do you have any plans for after high school?
I have been contacted by a few colleges but I really not for sure on where I want to go or what I want to do in college yet. Considering both of my parents went to the University of Minnesota it is definitely high up on my list, but I know that the future has a lot to hold and my mindset is likely to change as I move through the rest of my high school career.
Who coaches you in cross country?
Our head coach is Ross Fleming and our assistant coaches are Aaron Thompson, Bill Pratt, and Graham Wright. Fleming has a lot of strengths as a coach but I think his biggest strength is his experience. He has been our head coach for 31 years and with that he has coached many state qualifying teams and plenty of section champion teams. He knows how to coach a successful team and I know that our team respects and trusts his decisions.
Thompson is the assistant coach for the varsity training group and he is the one who puts together our training plan and our website and even runs with us on a lot of our runs. I feel like his biggest strength as a coach is how knowledgeable he is when it comes to running. I could ask him about anything from my running form to why my knee hurts and he will have an answer and solution to my problem.
Pratt and Wright are the JV coaches and I have not been coached by either of them much but I know that they are great coaches and both have many experiences with their own running careers. Pratt was a division 1 runner for Stanford in college and Wright does triathlons and iron mans every year.
