Fisher Hits One Milestone Early in Career

By: D. Scott Fritchen

The final 200 meters, Cecilia Fisher could see the official timer at the Chile Pepper Festival. Her mouth dry, the afternoon sun beating down, Fisher literally kicked up dust from the cross country course of soft rolling hills in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and spotted the numerals on the timer.

Seventeen-thirty. With 200 meters to go.

Fisher, a freshman from Overland Park, Kansas, raced a personal best 18:23 as a four-time qualifier for the Class 6A State Cross Country Championships, and the prospect of racing under 18 minutes loomed like a fading sun over the horizon: She chased it, yet had never caught it.

Now she had captured it, as she raced into the arms of her parents, Fernanda and William, and friends, with a time of 17:59.0 in the 5K at the Chile Pepper Festival last Friday.

Fisher, who graduated Summa Cum Laude at Blue Valley Northwest, found herself graduating to a new level in the sport that she loves.

"I'd been eyeing 18 minutes for a long time," she says. "The heat, I wasn't expecting it to hit me so hard. I was actually really surprised because I didn't think I'd run a great race, but then I kind of put my jets on and finished under that 18-minute mark."

The Kansas State women's cross country team finished fourth overall at the Chili Pepper Festival with 208 points while No. 13 Arkansas captured the Women's College 5K crown with 29 points on its home course. Fisher finished fourth for K-State behind juniors Sydney Burton (16:57.6), Hannah Stewart (17:18.8) and Cailan Steward (17:32.8).

Fisher will next race with her teammates at the Weis-Crockett Invitational at the Greiner Family OSU Cross Country Course in Stillwater, Oklahoma, on October 15.

Crossing the finish line at the Chile Pepper Festival, Fisher basked in gratitude over her personal accomplishment.

"It's definitely consistent training and just trusting in the training that Coach Cole has provided," she says. "That's definitely helped. I think also focusing on the little things, just staying health, doing lots of ice baths, and all the supplemental training has helped. I definitely am a big believer in doing the little things."

It all began with the binder. Coach Randy Cole gave each cross country runner a binder prior to the season. Each week, he prints off the training schedule. Prior to each race, he prints out the step-by-step layout of the course — "He's very thorough and definitely knows what he's doing, and brings a lot of knowledge and experience to the sport," Fisher says — then reviews the race results with individual splits.

"Everyone is very supportive and we work really hard together," Fisher says.

In her first collegiate meet, Fisher placed ninth overall with a 5K time of 19:15.3 at the Bob Timmons Classic. Then she ran a 18:13.6 at the Greeno/Dirksen Invitational on September 17.

February 10, 2022, LAWRENCE, KANSAS:K-State Cross Country competes at the 2022 Bob Timmons Invitational at RIM ROCK FARM in LAWRENCE, KANSAS Thursday, February 10, 2022. (Photo by Joshua Strong/Kansas State University Athletics) *** Local Caption ***

Already so early in her career, she had shown vast improvement, which comes as a surprise even to herself.

"I'm definitely surprised that I've been able to shave that time off," she says. "I've been very thankful for the great training and great camaraderie of all my teammates just pushing me when it gets tough."

Fisher figures to be in the mix the rest of the season and now eyes the new experience of racing a 6K.

"I've never run a 6K before so it'll be interesting to see how it goes, but I definitely want to keep being a contributing factor and be top five for our team," she says. "I don't completely know what's in store for our team, but I'd definitely love to do well as a team at the Big 12 Championships and having the team move on would be really exciting. I'd love to contribute to that."

Putting one foot in front of the other, Fisher is also managing the delicate balance between academics and athletics. Fisher chose K-State over the Naval Academy to remain close to her family, which attends every one of her races. She plans to major in Architectural Engineering.

"I always thought it'd be cool to help design houses or different architectural systems," she says. "I always loved playing with Legos, that's what I usually tell people. In middle school and high school I was involved in a lot of engineering classes, and that piqued my interest.

"Honestly, balancing academics and athletics, you have to really have good time management. I'm always constantly thinking about what I'm doing next or how I could best efficiently use this amount of time for homework or to talk with Coach or maybe do some supplemental work.

"I definitely have to be very on the ball with my time management and in looking ahead."

She looks at the proverbial timer, so far off in the distance of her college cross country career. There's no telling what she might accomplish down the road.

"My high school career was pretty exciting," she says. "I had a great team as well. I felt that I always kind of faltered on the big stage. In the state meets, I didn't always do as well as I'd hoped to. It was exciting, but I definitely could've done maybe a tiny bit better.

"I'm definitely hoping to perform better on the big stage here."

Kansas State University Athletics

Players Mentioned

Sydney Burton

Cecilia Fisher

Cailan Steward

Hannah Stewart

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