With the 10th Nike Cross Nationals less than six weeks away, the girls’ individual competition just got a little easier for the elite contenders as Alberto Salazar has confirmed that world-class high school superstar Mary Cain will probably not be in the field.

Asked about Cain’s plans for the fall, Salazar, who began coaching her a year ago, responded, “Mary will most probably not run any cross country races. She’s doing a remarkable job changing her form, but in order to handle it and not risk injury, she’s only up to five miles a day. And the workouts are not very fast as well.”

Earlier this fall, Cain, coming off a busy track season culminating in the world championships in Moscow in August, had kept the NXN door open. But with her focus on form refinements—better hip and arm position—in conflict with the bulked-up training necessary for cross country, she is building a foundation for continuing improvement during the 2014 track campaign.

It was a year ago when the running world buzzed as Salazar, the world-renowned coach of the Nike Oregon Project, began working with Cain, the New York phenom then starting her junior year at Bronxville High. It would take time for Cain’s enormous promise to become evident.

Last November, Cain won the NXN New York regional, running 17:43 on the hilly 5K course in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., to qualify for nationals. A week later on Dec. 1, Cain placed second to California’s Sarah Baxter at the mudfest in Portland, Ore., that was NXN 2012. Baxter, a Simi Valley junior, captured her second straight title, running 19:17 for 5K with Cain about 25 meters back in 19:21.

That was Cain’s last high school event before racing on the professional track circuit last January. Baxter will be remembered as the last high school runner to defeat Cain, who went on to break one high school record after another—from the 800m to the 5,000m, including a world-class 4:04.62 1500m—and place 10th in the world championships 1500m final. 

The prospect of Cain, as a high school senior, returning to NXN this fall in a rematch against Baxter—plus the addition of two other legitimate superstars, Elise Cranny of Colorado and Alexa Efraimson of Washington state—created “Race of the Century” anticipation. It would be the female version of Dathan Ritzenhein, Alan Webb and Ryan Hall running Foot Locker nationals in 2000.

Even without Cain in the field, the NXN girls individual race could live up to its billing. With their 1500m racing last spring, Cranny, a senior at Niwot High (seventh at NXN last year), and Efraimson, a junior at Camas High (fourth at NXN), have joined Cain on the short list of all-time high school greats.  

Cranny ran 4:15.07 for 1500m in a high school field. In an open race, she finished ahead of Efraimson, 4:15.86 to 4:16.00. Efraimson, then a mere sophomore, qualified for the World Youth Games in Donetsk, Ukraine, where in July she raced to the bronze medal in the 1500 in 4:16.07 behind a pair of Ethiopians.

This fall, Cranny is undefeated and on Saturday, she won her state 4A cross country title by 39 seconds over another nationally-ranked runner, Katie Rainsberger (Air Academy), who was 13th at NXN last year. Efraimson turned in the most startling performance of the season so far when she captured the open race at the Dellinger Invitational in Oregon on Oct. 5. Efraimson ran 16:35 for 5K to edge collegiate star Emma Bates of Boise State, who two weeks later won NCAA Pre-Nationals in Terre Haute, Ind., and was third in the NCAA 10,000m in June. Efraimson’s Washington state meet is this Saturday.

For her part, Baxter has been enjoying a bang-up season worthy of a two-time national defender. On Saturday Baxter reprised her sensational run at the mammoth Mt. SAC meet—19,000 entrants strong over two days—with a 16:11 girls “Team Sweepstakes” victory on the hilly 2.93-mile course in Walnut, Calif. (In her 2012 race, Baxter ran a course record-shattering 16:00, which many Californians consider their state’s single greatest girls cross country performance.)

In the end, maybe NXN will be better served without Cain this time around. She’s in another orbit now, and both her celebrity and likely dominance could have made the girls’ event more of a coronation than anything else. Now, with Baxter, Cranny and Efraimson pretty much on the same plane, we should have a real race on our hands.
 

Headshot of Marc Bloom
Marc Bloom

Marc Bloom’s high school cross-country rankings have played an influential role in the sport for more than 20 years and led to the creation of many major events, including Nike Cross Nationals and the Great American Cross Country Festival. He published his cross-country journal, Harrier, for more than two decades.