Ramona freshman Pulido is learning that in cross country, the longer the race the better

Pedro Pulido planned to try out for cross country when he entered Ramona High, but as an eighth-grader at Olive Peirce Middle School last year, he saw a flier about a running club.

“I knew I was pretty good from playing soccer,” said Pulido, “but when I started running, I found out I had a real passion for it.

“At lunch one day, she (Keira Pendergraph) gave me this piece of paper that had information about the Ramona Runners. I was playing club soccer at the time, but I got to really like running.”

Never having stepped on a track before, Pulido became one of the top San Diego-Imperial AAU runners in the spring, finishing third in the 3000-meter run at the USA Track and Field Championships, clocking a personal best time of 10-mnutes, 44-seconds.

He also raced over 1500 meters, where he ran 4:50, finishing sixth. He discovered the longer the race, the better.

Fast forward to cross country this fall and Pulido credits competing with the Ramona Runners for the base he established that has allowed him to finish second in the freshman races at two major invitational cross country meets.

The latest came at the Sundevil Invitational where he stretched it out to 3 miles and placed second in the Division 2 race for ninth-graders, losing only to a runner from Arizona, recording a time of 17:33.0.

“I feel I’m better at cross country than track; I like it better because I like the variety of the courses,” Pulido said. “I run the hills around Ramona on Mondays and I like that.

“In the Sundevil race I went out with the pack but stayed back. Then I started passing people and I passed everyone but the leader. Everything for me is a learning experience right now.

“Every meet is different, but I was a little sore from the Sundevil meet, so I’ve learned how to handle that. Learning how to handle the challenges is motivation for me and one of our coaches, Steve Albanese, has been helping me a lot with that.

“I’ve run six miles in training a few times, but the truth is I just go out and run right now, I don’t give it a lot of thought.”

Pulido is sometimes the Bulldogs’ No. 3 runner, sometimes No. 4, behind front-running George Meza.

“Pedro is always pushing not just to do the workout, but to do it faster,” said Ramona cross country coach Mike Pendergraph. “Sometimes he overdoes it, which could lead to injury, but it’s all new to him.

“Boys have a tendency to improve over their four high school years, and I expect him to do that because he has a great work ethic. Right now, he’s learning a lot and whatever you ask him to do, he does it without complaint.

“I expect him to be under 9:30 for the 3200 come track season if he keeps going like he is now. Actually, I believe his best race would be the 10K (10,000 meters) because he just seems to get better the longer he runs.”

Pulido, who is 5-foot-4, 115-pounds, actually put aside soccer (where he competed both recreationally and with travel clubs between the fifth and eighth grade), to focus on track and cross country, but he plans to return to try out for the Ramona team this winter, after cross country season.

“I’m a forward (in soccer) and since we don’t have a freshman team, I’ll just go out and see if I can make the team,” he said. “If I do, I think my running will help me. If I don’t, I can always just start training to run track.”

Pulido says between athletics and school, where anything but an “A” grade is rare, he doesn’t have time for many other activities but so far he has thoroughly enjoyed heading out either for practice or meets.

But he’s so new at it, he really doesn’t have a lot of individual goals.

“I’d like to help the team do as well as we can in the section championships (the Bulldogs are in Division 3),” said Pulido. “It would be great to make state, but I want to help us finish as high as we can as a team.”