Feels just like home

Feels just like home
By SCOTT SPRUILL
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC

Photo Credit
GORDON KING/Yakima Herald-Republic

Stephanie Shuel, right, runs in the lead of a 2005 cross country race with former teammate Michelle Schubert. Shuel will be racing in the featured final flight of the Sunfair Invitational Saturday at Franklin Park.
She knows the twists, turns and terraces of Franklin Park like it was her own backyard. And that familiarity offers Stephanie Shuel an equal share of reluctance and delight whenever October closes in.

\"I feel like I\'ve raced there all my life. It\'s like my home course,\" said the West Valley junior. But after a brief pause she added, \"It\'s like you dread going there at first because it\'s so tough, and then afterward it feels great.\"

When the 33rd annual Sunfair Invitational cross country meet swarms over Yakima\'s midtown park on Saturday, Shuel will be a participant for the ninth straight year, a streak that dates back to her victory in the grade-school race as a third-grader.

A diminutive yet powerful runner who possesses an ideal physique for Franklin\'s variety of hills, Shuel won five
grade-school Sunfair races between 1998 and 2003. But she\'s in the big show now — the seven-flight varsity meet — and she\'s enjoying the season she always dreamed of having since her early days.

Unbeaten in two Columbia Basin League meets, Shuel also won the Fort Steilacoom Invitational in Tacoma two weeks ago. She bested a field of 238 runners and clocked a career best of 18 minutes, 54 seconds for 5,000 meters.

It\'s a breakthrough earned not by piling up summer miles but rather by avoiding them.

\"This summer I took a nice break and I think that might have helped,\" she explained. \"Last summer I definitely over did it. I did a lot of camps and races and never really got much of a break. I think I was too tired at the end of the season.\"

Last cross country season ended with West Valley\'s girls celebrating a Class 3A state championship. But for Shuel it was at times a painfully anxious day.

West Valley\'s No. 3 runner the week before, Shuel slipped to No. 5 at Pasco and placed 36th overall — 15 places back of her freshman effort.

\"I was really shocked by that, but I think it had something to do with tiring out at the end of the season,\" she reflected. \"I was really worried and scared that I might have hurt the team.\"

Bringing home the top trophy — a prize earned by one point over Squalicum — eased her mind, but Shuel is still motivated by that day. Two-time state champ Michelle Schubert has graduated, but the Rams returned the rest of the team and they are ranked second in this week\'s state 3A poll.

\"We\'re doing wonderful, just clicking as a team,\" Shuel said. \"I wanted to do everything I could to help us this season. To me, helping the team is a better feeling than anything you do yourself.\"

Shuel has enjoyed plenty of personal achievement and she\'s learned it\'s not all smiles and rewards.

Not only an age-group star in cross country, Shuel was ahead of her time on the track as well, clocking varsity-caliber times in junior high. In the summer of 2002, she timed 2:26 in the 800 and 4:56 in the 1,500.

But the transition into high school racing presented rigorous challenges both mental and physical. Success was not immediate.

\"It was tough for me because it seemed like everybody knew who I was and they expected a lot out of me,\" she revealed. \"At first it was too much pressure, and I wasn\'t that sure of myself.\"

Coach Bob Allan remembers that transition well and admires Shuel\'s resilience.

\"Sometimes with a young runner that has the background she did, the first step in high school is not always forward,\" he said. \"There are so many expectations heaped on them, and Stef worked through that.

\"There were times when I think she was running not to fail, and I give her a lot of credit to weather that.\"

Stephanie Shuel runs in one of her five Sunfair age-group victories between 1998-2003. Shuel will race in the final featured flight on Saturday.
Wiser and admittedly more focused, Shuel is thrilled with her results so far this season since the Rams have another strong front-runner following the departure of Schubert. Moreover, she has lessened the pressure on sophomore Lisa Olander — last spring\'s state 1,600-meter champion — to quickly assume that role.

\"They\'ve definitely helped each other, and with Stef running this well you can almost see the pressure lifted off Lisa\'s shoulders,\" Allan noted. \"Instead of one worrying about what will happen with Michelle gone, they share that.\"

There was only one grade-school year when Shuel didn\'t win at Sunfair, and she remembers that one the most. As a fifth-grader competing up in the middle school race, Shuel finished second to Montana\'s Zoe Nelson, who later became a national star for Flathead High School and currently runs for the University of Oregon.

\"I thought that was really cool seeing her run. It was like she came out of nowhere,\" Shuel said of Nelson, who holds Sunfair\'s second-best girls time of 17:21. \"I\'ve always looked up to her and been inspired by her.\"

On Saturday, Olander will run the sixth flight and Shuel will race in the seventh and final featured race for the first time.

\"She\'s earned it, and it\'s been so gratifying seeing Stef\'s fresh attitude,\" Allan said. \"She\'s rejuvenated, there\'s a bounce in her stride and you can just see she\'s recaptured her confidence.\"

What: 33rd Sunfair Invitational cross country meet.

When: Saturday.

Where: Yakima\'s Franklin Park.

Race schedule: 3rd-6th grade, 8:45 a.m.; 7th-8th grade 9 a.m.; Freshmen, sophomore and junior varsity races, 9:30 to 11:30 a.m.; Varsity flights, seven 3-mile races, noon to 3:30 p.m.; Coaches and community run, 4 p.m. Note: Varsity flights are combined boys and girls until the seventh and final flight, which features the boys starting at 3 p.m. followed by the girls at 3:30.

Admission: Franklin Park will be fenced-off for the meet. Gates will be located at various spots around the park. Adults $5, students $3.