How Edgewood cross country's Zane Meyer made himself a front-runner

There's no time for any "pardon me's" as Zane Meyer rushes to the front of the line.

The Edgewood junior is one of the front runners now and there's no time for him or his Mustang teammates to waste after the starting gun goes off for another cross country race. Meyer's confidence is such that he's not the least bit afraid to put himself out there among the best.

"Just be willing to go out hard," Edgewood coach Zack Evans said. "That's the way we run our races. We want the first mile will be our fastest during the race. We're not looking to negative split. We want to make sure we're in the race from the beginning and it's made a huge difference."

And the huge difference for Meyer, who has knocked a good minute off his best time from last year and settles into the postseason as one of the top five runners heading to the Brown County Sectional, is the work he put into track last spring.

"Going into track season, I knew I had some goals, going low in the 3,200, maybe qualifying for the state meet," Meyer said. "That didn't happen, but I got to a point where I was able to run pretty fast.

"Transferring that to cross season, I was able to go out with the top guys this year and hang on longer because I was used to that pace."

Strava don't lie

Like a lot of athletes, Meyer will post his workouts on the app Strava, where his friends and followers are able to see the massive improvements in real-time.

"Other teams see what he's doing and I'll get texts from other coaches," Evans said. "'Is that real?' 'Did he really do that?'

"It's fun and almost intimidating to other teams to see how much improvement he's made and the work he and Jackson (Klinger) and the rest have put in is really cool."

There was plenty of motivation for Meyer, surrounded by a group of guys who just keep climbing the ladder and have now won back-to-back Western Indiana Conference titles. It's why he kept running in the first place.

Meyer was a basketball player who took to running to stay in shape and by the time he got to high school, he knew his future lay on the track and cross country course. Edgewood won the county cross country title his eighth grade year so the push was to keep that going.

"OK, we can be pretty good at this," Meyer said. "As freshmen, we ran well as freshmen. And sophomore year, we were pretty good. So just keep getting better."

That kind of attitude has a big effect on Evans' job, too.

"It makes it really, really easy, that they're all so self-motivated," he said. "They come up with ideas for how we do the next week. And they're extremely excited after the conference meet. Now, what can we do at regional?

"It was looking like we were pretty far back most of the year, then that turned out really well, they started talking, we really do have a shot at the state meet. To hear that come organically from them is pretty cool."

Finding a new level

Meyer will lead the charge, with Klinger, Trevor McCarty, Josh Kohne and Landon Beauchamp as the usual top five. WIC's were big.

"It put a lot of confidence in me and our team as well," Meyer said. "We know we're able to compete with the top teams finally."

And how about Meyer competing with the top runners in his path to state? It really started to click for him at the ultra-fast Columbus North Invitational, where he finished seventh in a career-best 15:41.

"I went out, there were some big names there, (Floyd Central's) Will Conway and others, and big teams," Meyer said. "I went out so fast I was leading at the K I was feeling so good. I kind of died off, but I was a minute under my PR."

"We knew it was coming," Evans said. "You could see in the workouts we do early on and even in the summer. You could see he was so far ahead of where he was, all the guys were so far ahead of where they were last year.

"So it was very much our goal at the early meets to try to go out hard, hold on and see what happens."

Being upfront is a whole other level of competition, often leaving a runner in no man's land, forced to push themselves if no one is nearby.

"I just keep in mind all the work I've put in and trust my training," Meyer said. "I just think, 'No risk, no glory', if you don't go out and run as fast as you can.

"When I go out and feel like I didn't run hard enough, I'm kind of disappointed."

That likely won't be an issue as he does his part to pull Edgewood to state as a team.

"That's my No. 1 goal," he said. "I feel like our team, we're good enough. We've put in the work all these years. All our guys can go out and run the times needed to make it and compete at the highest level."

At Brown County

Meyer is listed as the third-best behind CN's Neal White and Martinsville standout Martin Barco.

The boys will race at 10:30 a.m. and the girls follow at 11:15. The format is different this year, with just three postseason races (semistate was eliminated). The top five teams still advance, as well as the top 15 individuals not on those teams. Qualifiers from Brown County head to Evansville's Angel Mounds course for regional.

On the boys' side, Columbus North is the strong favorite followed by Edgewood, then Greensburg, Jennings County and Seymour. The rest of the field includes Brown County, Columbus East, Greensburg, Hauser, Martinsville, Monrovia, North Decatur, South Decatur and Trinity Lutheran.

On the girls' side, Columbus North and Edgewood, the WIC champs, should be well out front, followed by Seymour. Jennings County, Martinsville, Greensburg and Columbus East will battle for the final two spots. Individually, Martinsville's Laura Barco and Edgewood's Hannah Crain head the pack as the Mustangs could put four in the top 12.

At Bedford

The boys' team chase will be led by Bloomington North and South, with Orleans, Brownstown and the host Stars rated next in line, meaning Eastern Greene, will need a top performance to sneak out after finishing third in the SWIAC. The rest of the crowded field includes Bloomfield, Eastern (Pekin), Lighthouse Christian, Linton-Stockton, Loogootee, Mitchell, North Daviess, Salem, Shoals, West Washington and White River Valley. Individually, North's Jacob Mitchell and South's Ryan Rheam should be at the top. Jade Dawes will lead the way for Eastern.

South, which is looking to get both Martoglio twins back for the postseason at some point, should dominate, with or without them, with North, BNL, SWIAC champ Eastern Greene and Brownstown following. Individually, South's Lexi Kollbaum and Jasmine and Aurelia Martoglio (if either or both run), along with Linton's Peyton Smith, North's Nola Somers Glenn and Eastern's Lilyanna Blais and Esther Crane will fill in the gaps between the top Panther runners.

At Terre Haute

Owen Valley's squads will take off against Clay City, Cloverdale, Dugger Union, Greencastle, North Central, North Vermillion, Northview, Parke Heritage, Riverton Parke, Shakamak, South Putnam, South Vermillion, Sullivan, Terre Haute North, Terre Haute South and West Vigo.

The OV girls, led by Mallory Owen and Lily Smith are ranked fourth behind Northview, THN and THS and will be neck-and-neck with South Vermillion. John Sorenson lead the Patriot boys' squad.

Qualifiers from that sectional will head to the Brownsburg Regional.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: How Edgewood cross country's Zane Meyer made himself a front-runner