Riverbank's German Fernandez heads up Junior Men'sTeam USA
for IAAF World XC Championships
Story and Photos by Joe Hartman
The Pacific Association has had no shortage of outstanding junior distance runners come through the ranks. But it might strain the memory to come up with a boy-girl duo running at the same time who have the potential to leave an indelible mark not only in state prep history, but over a much broader spectrum as well.
Both Jordan Hasay of Arroyo Grande, CA and German Fernandez of Riverbank, CA have multiple state high school titles, course records, and both also became national champions at the 2008 US Cross Country Championships (and world meet qualifier) in San Diego. While Jordan (who repeated as national champion at this meet) will remain stateside to focus on her track and field commitments for 2008, German will be spearheading the USA junior men’s effort at the IAAF on Sunday in Edinburgh, Scotland.
He is making the trip with USA teammates Ryan Sheridan (Iona), Emil Heineking (Univ. of Virginia), Bobby Moldovan (N.C. State), and fellow high schoolers Kevin Williams of Colorado and Ben Johnson of New Mexico. By the way, except in his immediate family, German is usually pronounced with a soft ‘g’.
While no two running careers are exactly alike, there’s probably never been one quite like this one.
German played football at first and didn’t begin running until track his freshman year. After six weeks of training, he dropped a few jaws with a 4:33 for his debut 1600 meter race and swept the three distance events at the Trans-Valley League finals (800m, 1600m, 3200m). He just missed the state meet by finishing fourth in the 1600 meters with a time of 4:22.95.
Riverbank Bruins girls coach Jeep Oliveira said his gift for running was obvious before he ever got to high school. “With no training at all, he always went straight to the front in junior high meets. He loves to compete and loves winning and breaking course records.”
Potential met reality during German’s sophomore year in cross country. That, and fear of losing to a girl. German won his first of three section titles at Willow Hill course in Folsom in 2005 and challenged teammate Maritza Garcia to do the same, which she did. Two weeks later, Maritza won her state race in Fresno over Taylor Johnson of San Lorenzo Valley by six seconds. “Your turn”, Maritza challenged and, literally, the race was ‘on’. Fernandez (15:14) roared to a 36 second win over Chad Hall of Big Bear for his first state title.
A meniscus tear playing basketball his sophomore year, which wasn’t really diagnosed until after a difficult track season, didn’t prevent German from winning sections in cross his junior year, but the combination of a lack of summer base and a strong senior year by Chad Hall reversed the order of finish at the 2006 D4 state finals. German was the state runner-up with a time of 15:37. He followed that up with a 9:13 3200 meter win at the Masters track finals and then finished 3rd at the state meet behind Hall and winner Eric Avila of Bonita Vista. German’s time at the state meet was 9:08.05.
Fernandez steamed into the 2007 cross season with more base and health than any season to date. His section finals time of 15:03 on a very physically and mentally-challenging venue established a course record and spurred talk of something great happening at state. Winning by nearly two minutes was impressive but so was his ability to recover (assuming he was even tired) and sprint back about 350 meters to cheer on his Bruin teammates as they squeezed out a 3-point win over Christian Brothers.
There were nine other races, but all the state meet buzz centered on German Fernandez’ chances to break Marc Davis’ course record of 14:38. Fortunately it was not too warm on race day as fans had to wait until the last race of the day to see if history would be made. They stayed and they roared as their patience was rewarded. Fernandez was 4:27 for mile one, 9:12 at the two mile mark, and as announcer Keith Conning could barely be heard above the mayhem, German destroyed the 21-year old benchmark with a time of 14:24. For many, it was the most thrilling high school cross country race they had witnessed.
The difficult state/Footlocker West/Footlocker Nationals trifecta of intense racing caught up to German at Footlocker Nationals. He won the Footlocker West race in a time of 14:53 at Mt. SAC and did a fine job of holding onto third at nationals, 19 seconds behind Mike Fout of LaPorte, Indiana. From that point it was off to San Diego in February and a longer race at USATF nationals. Unlike the state meet where German’s only opponents were computer chips and display circuitry, his opponent down the stretch in San Diego had equal amounts of talent, heart, and desire in the form of Ryan Sheridan of Iona College. Oliveira points to Fernandez as not only having an uncommon amount of natural talent, but “the ability to overcome”. And overcome he did to win by mere strides, 24:18 to 24:19 over eight kilometers.
Coach Oliveira also credits Riverbank boys’ coach Bruce Edwards with a great job of handling German in terms of training, scheduling, and seeing the big picture. “Bruce has had lots of experience with pretty decent runners and German came along at a great time in Bruce’s career. He’d be the first to tell you this wouldn’t have been the same at the start of his career,” Oliveira said with a chuckle.
Adding to his mystique is the fact that Fernandez competes in a smaller league in a rural environment. Even in his own section, few people could drive straight to Riverbank without a map or a Magellan. Not only that, but Fernandez sightings are even rarer in Sacramento than those of Jordan Hasay, who lives over 300 miles away. But every now and then, another bit of legend trickles out from the hinterlands via weblog or message board of yet another Bunyan-esque performance that has skeptics and believers alike struggling to comprehend.
At an early season track meet just weeks ago which was something of a prep for worlds, Fernandez ran four events but still cruised to the nation’s leading time in the 3200 meters in less than ideal conditions. He ran the race mostly in lane 2 because of several lapped girl and boy runners… in flats… into a backstretch headwind with unequal tailwind… following a 4:20+ 1600m… 20-30 minutes after a 1:58+ 800m… and 10 minutes prior to a 53+ second 400m split in the 4x400 relay. His 3200 meter time: 8:53.6, an unreal time for March.
Team competition means more than anything to German Fernandez - even if it’s starting to get hard to keep track of his teams. He’s been a Bruin. This weekend he’s a ‘Yankee’. But next year he’ll be a Cowboy.
“Not many kids wake up in California and say I want to live in Oklahoma”, admits cross country coach Dave Smith of Oklahoma State. “But we focus on middle and long distance running and he fit in well with the other guys on the team”. German also liked the training environment and the Cowboys are able to do 80-90% of their running on dirt, which is obviously more forgiving on the knees.
What most impressed the Cowboys the most about Fernandez was his attitude. “He’s incredibly coachable”, said Coach Smith. “You could even tell over the phone. German is team-oriented and shies away from individual accomplishments. He wants to win a national team title.” He’s still months away from stepping foot on the Stillwater campus, but that didn’t stop Fernandez from cheering Cowboy freshmen Ryan Little and Joshua Mathis to top ten finishes in San Diego. Both came up just short of joining German in Scotland.
While his team philosophy was recognized by Smith, the Cowboys team success was reciprocally noticed by Fernandez. Oklahoma State finished third at the ’07 NCAA’s (behind Oregon and Iona) and only have four upperclassmen on their roster. Counting German, four of the top fourteen runners at this year’s junior men’s race were Cowboys. Colby Lowe of Southlake, Texas, who was fourth at Footlocker Nationals, is also on his way to the prairie.
Fernandez and Team USA will receive a test unlike any other Sunday in Scotland when they toe the line in Holyrood Park at the IAAF World Meet. For the junior men, the international-style course consists of four two-kilometer loops and at the end of every loop save the first, the athletes will have to navigate a steep and somewhat treacherous slope known as Haggis Knowe. The course could be heavy and sloppy as a 60% chance of rain is forecast for the weekend. But it’s those three ascents – and decents – of Haggis Knowe that could reveal the most about a runner on Sunday. In German’s case, it wouldn’t be surprising at all if it was his ‘fourth’ ascent – the one where he heads back to the course and exhorts his teammates onto the finish – that provides a bigger glimpse inside the character of this team player.
