Julia Stradinger, Jackson Preparatory on the way to win Class 5A MAIS State
3. Julia Stradinger Jackson Preparatory Junior
Coming in at #3 is the MAIS superstar from Jackson Prep, Julia Stradinger. This girl is legit. Say what you want about the MAIS not being as strong as the MHSAA, Stradinger can hold her own in any race she runs in. She proved this too, with wins at the Ocean Springs invitational, and even more impressive, her strong win at MC Watson. She went undefeated in all six of her races this year, and in most of those races, she found that it was just her and the clock by the time she came through the first mile. The only race that she was really pushed was the MC Watson Invitational, in which she won in an 18:50, her first time under 19 minutes for the 5k in her career. Well deservedly, too, as she had to go through Alabama star Lindsey Baxter to get the win.
Perhaps the thing that stuck out most for Stradinger this year is simply just the way that she raced. A lot of times, when you see runners that usually are way out front get in a race where they're not out front anymore, they can run an underwhelming performance, or perhaps just blow up altogether. Stradinger, however, proved at Watson that she can handle that kind of stress. Even though her margin of victory was only 4 seconds, she was calm and collected, and she looked like she knew what she was doing the whole race. You would have never guessed that she had just run a 32 second PR. Her form never changed, she was composed, and that's the kind of stuff you look for in elite runners. Watch out for her come track season folks, as she has the capability to really pop off something special in the spring.