Nico Young isn’t used to being in the back of the pack. The 17-year-old from Newbury Park, California, went undefeated in cross-country last year, ultimately winning the 2019 Advertisement - Continue Reading Below in a course record time of 14:52.23 and leading the Newbury Park High School team to victory in the process.
At the Millrose Games on Saturday, February 8, however, Young found himself in a less familiar position: hanging onto the backs of his competition. He was entered unattached in the elite 3,000 meters, which was headlined by pros like 2017 NCAA cross-country champion Justyn Knight and 2019 Collegiate Records Go Down at BU.
Young’s goal heading into the race was to break the high school indoor 3K record, 7:59.33, which was set by Drew Hunter in 2016. To do that, though, meant staying composed while going deep into the well, considering the field was aiming for finish times 15 seconds faster.
“I knew I had to stay on the back of the pack for as long as I possibly could,” Young told Runner’s World after the race. “It started feeling hard after a mile. I told myself, ‘This is what I came here to do, I just have to focus my eyes on the next guy in front of me and chase him down.’”
Despite the challenging pace, the high school senior proved that he could hang with the big kids. Knight won the race in 7:46.36, and Young finished in 7:56.97—even though he crossed the line last, he ran a new high-school record by more than two seconds. His 1000-meter splits were almost exactly even: 2:39.20, 2:38.69, and 2:39.09.
“I knew I was on pace at the mile, but after that point, I didn’t know my pace. It started feeling hard after a mile,” he said. “That was the deepest I’ve ever dug in a race. I didn’t know what time I was at with 200 to go. I was just thinking, last lap, I’ve gotta go.”
Because there is no indoor track season sanctioned by the CIF-Southern Section for his high school, Millrose was just the second indoor race ever in which Young has raced. Last year, he ran his first indoor meet unattached at the New Balance Grand Prix in Boston.
After Advertisement - Continue Reading Below, Young said that he and his coaches decided to chase the 3K record at The Armory in 2020. With a talented field to set the pace, Millrose promised a good shot at attempting the record.
“Not many people have broken 8:00 [for the indoor 3K] in high school and this was the perfect opportunity,” Young said. “It’s really satisfying now, because I know all that work was worth it.”
Young took just one day off after Advertisement - Continue Reading Below last December before beginning training for indoor track. During this time, he committed to run beginning this fall at Northern Arizona University, whose cross-country team won the NCAA national title three straight years from 2016 to 2018 and finished second last year. A few weeks before Millrose, Young and his coach, Sean Brosnan, studied videos of past 3,000-meter races to get familiar with individual race tactics and better visualize the track.
“I always watch my competitors on YouTube. I watched past years of this race beforehand. I think that’s pretty essential,” he said.
While he’s one of the top high school distance runners of all time now, he knows that it’s not going to be all wins and records. His advice to younger runners is to All About 75 Hard.
“When you have a bad day or something, you have to just push it out of your mind and don’t let it get to you,” he said. “I think that’s really important.”
Now that he’s executed his goal, Young is taking a much-deserved break. “I want to just hang out with my friends this week and indulge a little bit,” he said. “This will be a rest week. We’ll go to the movies, hang out at each other’s houses, and go out to dinner. Just the usual stuff.”
This spring, Young will be focusing on the two mile outdoors, and has plans to compete at the Arcadia Invitational high school meet in Los Angeles.
Hailey first got hooked on running news as an intern with Running Times, and now she reports on elite runners and cyclists, feel-good stories, and training pieces for Runner's World and Bicycling magazines.
