2 athletes racing toward their dreams

SANDY — Not many high school kids can outsmart Jordan High runners Miles Batty and Jared Bienlien — in long-distance races or in the classroom.

For that matter, not many prep student-athletes can outrun them, either.

"Both of those guys are very intelligent. Jared's a Sterling Scholar and Miles is Academic All-State in cross country," said Jordan's track and cross country coach Clay Twigg. "I got really lucky, let's put it that way."

Jordan High also got really lucky. The two seniors led the Beetdiggers to the school's first cross country championship last fall, with Batty earning first-place honors and Bienlien taking home the third-place prize.

Now they're hoping that success will vault them into contention in this spring's track season.

"It was an awesome day," Batty said of the October afternoon at Sugarhouse Park. "It's definitely nice to have that championship to lift everybody up. . . . It will be a little harder (to win track) than in cross country."

The most difficult challenge in winning a track title is that a team has to excel at so many events — but if the 'Diggers sprinting and field athletes can step up to the long-distance crew's level, Jordan could be a major player.

At least the team knows it will be strong long, led by two guys who have great names for runners (Bienlien is pronounced bee-line, and, yes, Miles was his name before he started racing 3.1 of them for fun).

Best-case scenario, Jordan could have some national champions racing for the school soon. Batty, Bienlien, Ryan Bingham and Brian Summers — four runners who've made great strides over the years to put the Sandy school on the local long-distance map — will compete in the indoor national finals in New York City next weekend. They've all qualified for the 4-by-1-mile relay, while Batty and Bienlien also will go against the country's best in the individual 5,000-meter race.

Though competing in that high-caliber competition is a dream for high school runners, it's also created an inner debate for Bienlien. He is the captain of Jordan's powerhouse debate team and was forced to choose between running at nationals or trying to help the Beetdiggers' orators win an eighth straight state championship at the 5A debate finals that same weekend.

While Bienlien has proved he can go cross country pretty quickly, not even his fast legs can help him be both places at once.

"It's so unfortunate," he said about the timing. "I had to sit down and think real hard about that for two or three weeks."