Ventura senior Anthony Fast Horse is The Star's Boys Cross Country Runner of the Year
There were peaks. There were valleys.
Anthony Fast Horse knows how to keep his momentum going forward, no matter the topography.
“Honestly, when I look back at the season there’s obviously disappointment,” Fast Horse. “But I can’t be disappointed when I ran superfast at Woodbridge and Clovis.”
The Ventura High senior shot out of the gates like a thoroughbred, running a personal-best 13:48.1 to finish second in the three-mile sweepstakes race at the Woodbridge Classic on Sept. 16.
He followed that with a personal-best 14:32.5 to win the annual Asics Clovis Invitational on Oct. 7.
Which is why he spent much of the fall ranked as the No. 1 runner in the state, per PrepCalTrack.com.
“I don’t think I’ll ever lose that feeling of running with other elite athletes,” Fast Horse said.
He then broke Ventura High head coach Josh Spiker’s 24-year-old record at Lake Casitas on Oct. 15, when he won the Ventura County Championships in 14:48.2.
The Star’s All-County Boys Cross Country Runner of the Year then took a recruiting visit to the University of Oregon and committed to one of the top running programs in the country.
“I see a lot of future in the program,” Fast Horse said. “To be able to be trained by (coach Jerry Schumacher) next year is the most exciting thing.”
But a tight hamstring woke up Fast Horse’s dream season in the postseason, keeping him from his ultimate goal of competing at Nike Cross Nationals.
“He had a tight hamstring from the beginning,” Spiker said. “For most of the season it was under control. It flared up a couple times. There was just inopportune timing right at the end.”
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Fast Horse was at the CIF-State championships at Woodwark Park, making a surge near the course’s halfway mark, when his hamstring finally gave out on him.
“I just felt a super tight pain in my leg,” Fast Horse said. “I didn’t really have energy anymore. That one leg was gone.”
Fast Horse was able to finish 14th in the Division II meet in 15:33.2, five seconds behind teammate Micah Grossman, to help Ventura take second as a team.
“It was just bad luck,” Fast Horse said. “I just ended up having a freak injury. That affected the state meet.”
Fast Horse had finished second at the CIF-Southern Section Division 2 finals, just behind UCLA-bound Andreas Dybdahl of Santa Barbara.
“I couldn’t really complain about the result,” Fast Horse said. “To run 14 low is still is pretty fun. It’s better that somebody from our league wins than someone else, that’s how I look at it.”
Fast Horse took his recruiting visits over summer and into the fall, enjoying trips to Tennessee, Oklahoma State and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
“All the schools I visited I really liked,” Fast Horse said. “It really taught me a lot about what life will like when I go to school.”
He saved his trip to Eugene for last, going after his performance at Woodbridge.
“It came down to the environment in Eugene and Hayward Field,” Fast Horse.
He remembers taking a recovery run on campus and hearing strangers call out to cheer him on.
“They love their runners in Oregon,” Fast Horse said. “It truly is a special place. Now I get why they call it ‘TrackTown USA.’ ”
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Fast Horse will run for Schumacher, who coached Spiker during his career at the University of Wisconsin.
“It was awesome,” Spiker said of his time running for Schumacher. “That was the main reason I went to Wisconsin. If it wasn’t for Jerry, I would have never considered a school like Wisconsin.
“He’s totally down to earth, always thinking and processing what he thinks is going to be best that day. He’s really good on the feel aspect of coaching. He can just see and feel things that most coaches can’t.”
Fast Horse has taken three weeks off to allow his hamstring to heal. He tested it for the first time Monday, as he begins to train for the track season.
“This week is making sure his hamstring is healed properly,” Spiker said. “The next few weeks are just trying to get our mileage back up. … We’re just trying to get him strong.”
Fast Horse is planning on running at the New Balance Indoor Nationals in Boston in March to kickstart his spring season.
“It’s going to be my second race of the year,” Fast Horse said. “I’m going to go there and use it as an opportunity to run fast against some good guys.”
The Star’s All-County Boys Cross Country Second Team
Henry Hammel, Ventura
Logan Torres, Buena
Darrick Jacob, Agoura
Grant Jones, Oak Park
Asa Fletcher, Newbury Park
Hunter Lee, Moorpark
Chance Leandro, Foothill Tech
Conor White, Foothill Tech
Sam Bado, Royal
Eduardo Vigil, Fillmore
Joe Curley covers high school, collegiate and professional football for The Star. He can be reached at joe.curley@vcstar.com. For more coverage, follow @vcspreps on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Anthony Fast Horse is The Star's Boys Cross Country Runner of the Year
