Lane hopes emphasis on speed leads to big results in distance races

After running outdoor national lead in 3,200, Malibu sophomore taking on mile at Stanford Invitational in preparation for anticipated showdown with Oakley at Arcadia Invitational

By Erik Boal, DyeStat Editor

For Claudia Lane, the regular season is going to be about quality over quantity.

The Malibu CA sophomore ran an outdoor national-leading 10 minutes, 12.21 seconds March 25 in the 3,200 meters at the New Balance Azusa Meet of Champions Distance Classic at Azusa Pacific University and will now shift her attention Saturday to the mile at the 43rd Stanford Invitational.

“I’m not going to kill myself and do the (3,000) and the mile because I want to save up for Arcadia and everything,” Lane said. “At Stanford, I’ll be doing the mile and I’m excited for that, and Arcadia, I’ll be doing the 3,200 and that’s it because I’m not going to double up until CIF.”

Lane doubled March 11 in the 800 and 1,600 at the Tri-County Invitational. She ran both the 1,600 and 3,200 on March 18 at the Marie Smith/Malibu Invitational and again March 23 in a Frontier League tri-meet against La Reina and St. Bonaventure, but the races were used more for training and scoring points for the Sharks.

But her emphasis will be on just one race at Stanford and again April 8 at the 50th Arcadia Invitational, where a 3,200 showdown with Grandview CO senior Brie Oakley is expected to materialize in a matchup of Nike Cross Nationals and Foot Locker national cross country champions.

“I really want to improve my time in the 3,200 and hopefully I can get in the low 10s, so we’ll see how that goes,” Lane said. “I’d like to (double), but my coach doesn’t really want me doing both at the same (meet), just to make sure I can conserve my energy for one and get a good time in the 3,200.”

Lane has never run in a mile race in high school, with her personal-best 1,600 coming March 4 when she clocked 4:53.23 at the Don Green Memorial Invitational.

She’ll be aiming for the national-leading mile mark of 4:46.97 run March 25 by Oakley at the NIKE Chandler Rotary Invitational in Arizona.

“I want to improve my mile time and really work on speed this season, as well as doing the 3,200,” Lane said. “For cross country, it’s more about endurance, but I really want to build up my speed work this season. I think the one mile is going to help propel me and give me the speed I need for the 3,200.”