Payton Godsey is The Star's Girls High School Cross Country Runner of the Year
It’s not that Payton Godsey didn’t expect to run fast this fall.
It’s just that, race after race, the Oaks Christian School runner kept pushing those expectations skyward.
Until she arrived at a season beyond her imagination.
“I set my eyes on high goals and kept upping those goals week after week,” Godsey said. “I accomplished more than I could have imagined before the season started.”
After amassing a full set of league, section, state and national championships, Godsey can add The Star’s All-County Girls Cross Country Runner of the Year honor to her haul.
“In a sense, she was able to press the accelerator to the floor and be able to keep going,” Oaks Christian coach Wes Smith said. “She’s built some trust in what she’s capable of doing.”
Belief in her training and dogged determination left Godsey adorned with a wrestling-style championship belt after slogging through cold mud to win the Garmin RunningLane national championship in Huntsville, Alabama, earlier this month.
“The conditions were pretty tough,” Godsey said. “It was very muddy.”
Third with just 800 meters left, Godsey mustered a final push to win the 5,000-meter girls’ gold division race in 17 minutes, 28.30 seconds, at John Hunt Running Park.
“The last 400 meters,” Godsey said, “I was just running for my life.”
It was a moment that showed the 16-year-old has more than just a talent for running.
“What has allowed her to continue towards her potential is her mindset,” Smith said. “She’s a very level-headed, very tough and very determined young lady. … It makes coaching her easy to a degree.”
Teammate Grace Geyer said Godsey’s attention to detail and focus separates herself from the pack.
“She goes to bed early, she drinks a lot of water, she sacrifices a lot of little things about her day (to succeed),” Geyer said. “We’ve trained more in the weight room this year and that’s helped her a lot this well. She’s so focused on even the little things. She’s always ready to run. It’s very rare to see a bad day at practice because she’s so focused.”
Godsey comes from a family of runners.
Her parents, Brian and Andrea, both ran at Cal State Northridge.
“I kind of grew up around the sport,” Godsey said.
She was 8 years old when she followed her older brother Ethan into youth track.
“I never stopped,” Godsey said. “I kind of fell in love with the sport.”
Ethan Godsey, now at UC Santa Barbara after a standout high school career at Agoura High, was named Big West Conference Freshman of the Year earlier this month.
The siblings are spending the break between cross country and track seasons training together.
“We went to separate high schools so we didn’t get to train together too much,” Godsey said. “He just got home from college. We’re in an offseason cycle, we’ve been doing a lot of runs together.”
While she especially loves competing at Mt. SAC and Woodward Park — “You can really push the pace there,” Godsey said of the state meet course in Fresno — Godsey prepares herself for competition by running Lower Cheeseboro Canyon Trail in Agoura Hills.
“It’s a trail that I’ve been running for a very long time,” Godsey said. “There’s some ups and downs as it just winds through the mountains and there’s a lot of pretty oak trees. … It’s a cool place that I love to run in.”
Godsey foreshadowed her glittering season by finishing second to Ventura sophomore Sadie Engelhardt by a nine-second margin in the sweepstakes race at the Woodbridge Cross Country Classic in September.
“Sadie has pressed the standard nationwide,” Smith said. “That first matchup they had at Woodbridge, we kind of felt like Payton had come a long way. Last year, I don’t think she got within 30 seconds of her. And it’s not like Sadie is slowing down.”
Godsey won the Marmonte League finals in a three-mile personal record of 16:43.1 at Agoura High on Nov. 3. She won the CIF-Southern Section Division 4 championship at Mt. San Antonio College in 16:54.2 on Nov. 19. She won the CIF-State Division 4 championship in a 5,000-meter personal best of 17:00.1 on Nov. 26.
Then she turned down a berth at Nike Cross Nationals to run with her teammates at RunningLane.
“She’s one of the most team-centered people out there,” said teammate Sarah Colebrooke. “Even with all her individual accolades and accomplishments, she’s still all about the team.”
Godsey, who finished No. 21 in DyeStat.com’s final national rankings, explained that she prefers memories to medals.
“I had a great time and I really enjoyed the racing aspect from an individual standpoint, but more than anything I had the time of my life with my teammates,” Godsey said. “We had so much fun and we were able to make some really good memories on and off the course. That’s what I’m going to remember from this season.”
The Star's All-County Girls Cross Country Second Team
Grace Geyer, Oaks Christian
Rae Rae Castagna, Westlake
Kalista Traversa, Westlake
Keera Wallace, Foothill Tech
Jenna Johnson, Agoura
Reese Tamburro, Agoura
Kristen Gibbel, Moorpark
Niza Laureano, Fillmore
Keera Wallace, Foothill Tech
Cassidy Kajita, Thousand Oaks
Joe Curley is a staff writer for The Star. He can be reached at joe.curley@vcstar.com. For more coverage, follow @vcspreps on Twitter.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Payton Godsey is our Girls Cross Country Runner of the Year
