Athlete Profile: Holly Lung of Arcadia High School

Holly Lung. – Photo by Aaron Chan

By Kimberly Lo, AHS Correspondent

Junior Holly Lung is an outstanding cross country runner at AHS who was recently named SoCal Prep Legends Girls Athlete of the Week. This honor is fitting, as Holly and her team have experienced great successes this month. Recently, at the Stanford Invitational (SI) held at Palo Alto, Holly and her fellow Apache runners put all their efforts together to earn the coveted seeded division title. Holly individually placed 4th at the SI, running a 5km race in 17:43! At the Woodbridge Invitational, she placed 8th, and at the Pacific League multi­dual meet which took place at Crescenta Valley Park, she placed 3rd. In addition, at the Mt. San Antonio College Girls Team Sweepstakes race on Oct. 24, Holly took the gold with a time of 17:17.

Holly remembers how she was first inspired to start what would be – and is – an extremely successful running career. Holly first began running when she was in eighth grade because her “PE teacher told [her that she] had the potential to be pretty fast.” Roughly three years from when she started running in eighth grade, Holly has developed into a superb runner who is leading her team to great results at each of its meets. Holly has big goals that she is actively working toward. Currently, Holly’s goal for herself is to be one of the top 15 ranked individuals for the state championship. She hopes that the “team can place in the top three so [it] can move on to Nike Cross Nationals (NXN). NXN is where the best teams in the entire country compete, and Nike gives them a load of free stuff!”

SI took place on Sept. 26 at the Stanford Golf Course in Palo Alto, where the girls’ team placed first and the boys’ team placed a close second. Holly had an exciting and memorable time at the invitational: “At SI, there were white robes in the hotel rooms, and everyone took hilarious pictures in them! We even started the hashtag #robechallenge2K15! It’s so much fun when everyone gets really into it.” Not only did Holly and the Girls Varsity Cross Country team earn exceptional results at SI, but they also had fun moments and unforgettable experiences that ultimately brought them together and cemented team chemistry.

Currently, Holly is a junior, and for the future she aspires to “get signed to run for a good college.” In addition, she hopes that “running can open more doors to potential colleges” after high school. As for her thoughts on the cross country season so far, Holly thinks that “this season has been really good so far.” She is happy with the times and places she has been getting, and has also seen herself improve in her speed workouts. Overall, Holly is excitedly anticipating the rest of the season.

Congratulations to Holly for her achievements in the cross country season thus far, and good luck to her in her future endeavors!

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