Athlete of the Week: El Camino’s Noe Diep

Never mind how bright the future is for the demure 5-1 freshman. While it most certainly is bright, the fact is the future is now for Diep, who crushed it Saturday at Woodward Park in Fresno. In her first career run on the 3.1-mile course, she took 31st place out of a field of 214 runners in the Division III race, including the second-best time for a CCS freshman of 19 minutes, 16.6 seconds.

“I was very proud of myself because I never thought I would come that far,” Diep said. “I wasn’t expecting to place like that. And it was a [personal record] for me in all my races at that distance.”

Earning Daily Journal Athlete of the Week honors for cross-country wasn’t anything Diep even dared to dream entering the school year. Running wasn’t something she’d ever done competitively prior to high school. With her focus on the soccer pitch — she has played club soccer with the San Bruno Lowen Soccer Club for the past eight years — her primary motivation for joining the cross-country team was to stay in soccer shape.

“I was just trying to find a way to condition for soccer and stay in shape,” Diep said, “and I decided to go with cross-country. And I ended up liking it a lot.

In reporting for cross-country practice on her second day of high school, Diep walked boldly into a brave new world. She had never met any of the coaches. She had yet to make friends with anyone on the team.

It didn’t take her long, however, to make an impression on the Elco brass.

“From the first day she came out at practice we were all impressed with her,” El Camino cross-country head coach Erin Oliveira said. “So, she blew us out of the water from day one. [Her performance] was up there with the boys. And she improved so much over the season.”

While Diep made an immediate splash for a freshman, her regular-season results weren’t extraordinary. In each of the three Peninsula Athletic League meets, she finished no better than 10th, and in the last two races was bested by Woodside’s Elle Marsyla for the best freshman time.

She even faltered in the PAL finals Nov. 3 at Crystal Springs, after contending with illness in the days leading up to the race, taking 24th among varsity girls, with only the fifth-best freshman time, and over a minute off her previous time on the rigorous Belmont course.

While underwhelming, Diep’s performance in the PAL finals was enough to qualify for the CCS finals, where she realized her potential in a hurry. She tackled Toro Park with a time of 19:49.9. Only PAL Division III champion, Mills senior Tessa Chen, was better. She also recorded the second-best time of any freshman from all five divisions.

“She was doing decent all season but I think she peaked when she needed to peak,” Oliveira said.

The journey to Fresno’s Woodward Park was as new to Diep as it was to the El Camino girls’ team. It had been five years since any Colts runner advanced to the state meet, when Gerardo Castro reached the boys’ state championship in 2013.

Diep was admittedly nervous, but in arriving a day early to scout the terrain of the course, she had a good game plan entering the race.

“I was just trying to keep myself calm because I just wanted to get through it,” Diep said.

The tactics that saw her advance on the back half of the course were born from her soccer training — miles and miles spent running in the hilly sands of the San Francisco beach at Fort Funston.

“That really helped me,” Diep said. “I could go up [the hills] easier and push it through.”

After a rough start, getting blocked from the opening gun and relegated to the last third of the field, Diep had to make up ground. And as the terrain got hillier, make up ground she did. The larger hills at Woodward Park are toward the end of the second mile, where she started picking off runners and moving up.

She ultimately finished with the fourth-best time of any Division III freshman, the second-best time among CCS Division III runners, the best time of a CCS Division III freshman, and the second-best CCS freshman time from all five divisions — only the Division I time of 19:14.3 by Monta Vista freshman Jannah Sheriff was better.

Here’s the kicker. Two days later, Monday at 6 p.m. to be precise, Diep reported for her first day of El Camino girls’ soccer practice. Take some downtime to recoup from cross-country season? No way. The future is now.

“I think she’s fast, she’s got a ton of endurance, and she’s been playing soccer for a really long time,” Oliveira said. “So, I’m excited to see her on the soccer field … and on the track in the spring.”