By SARAH CLARK

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Bryson Lewis is an all-star on the soccer field.

Bryson Lewis, left in his soccer uniform, and right in his cross country uniform.

He was a captain of the Blanchester High School co-league champion boys soccer team where he scored 17 goals and made 15 assists. He was awarded Southern Buckeye Conference first-team honors for his efforts.

The busy junior also is the percussion section leader in the school’s marching band.

As if that isn’t enough for Lewis — he also joined the cross country team when soccer season ended … just in time to advance to the state championship.

Lewis took 52nd in the Division II state championship with a season-best time of 16:45.

Not bad considering his only warm-up for the post season was the SBC championship race in which he won the individual title.

“At the beginning of they year I thought about getting to some of the meets but couldn’t because of soccer and band. Soccer season was over by the time we got to league and that gave me the opportunity to get to the league cross country meet,” said Lewis. “I didn’t even know what I was going to do at league. I was just hoping to stay with our top runner at Blanchester.”

He makes running look easy.

Lewis did not train as a cross country runner at all. He focused on what little soccer conditioning the team had before beginning ball work. He did have a bit of distance training under his belt having won the SBC track and field 1- and 2-mile championships last season.

“We had some conditioning for soccer, about two weeks and then we got away from that. Then, after soccer season was over, I went and ran at league and I trained a little bit that next week and went to district and trained every day after district. I would like to train more because I think that would have helped more,” said Lewis.

It was a different feeling stepping onto the cross country course instead of a soccer field, however.

“It was weird at first because I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know what the other runners would expect,” said Lewis. “It was more on myself — more mental for me because it is a more individual sport. It helped me overcome things a lot better.”

Lewis found a lot of success in just four races this season.

He claimed the SBC title, finished 12th at the DII Southwest District championship, 11th at regional and 52nd at state. In his regional performance, he was the first runner from the Southwest District to cross the finish line.

So what is a champion runner to do?

Soccer or cross country?

For now, there won’t be any choosing.

“I have always liked soccer more. That has been my dream for a while to move on in soccer, but I am also going to see what I can do with cross country,” said Lewis. “It felt good just to go in there. It was a confidence booster because I didn’t know what was going to happen. I didn’t know if I was going to be able to be up in front at all let alone win the race. I was really nervous when I was standing around waiting for the race to start and getting warmed up. I was thinking I wish I had trained more and started a little earlier in the year so I could have done a little better at state.

“I wasn’t going to do cross country too much my senior year, but after the success I have had, I am going to go after it a lot more.”

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