Strath Haven grad Forbes going distance for success
Grace Forbes’ college career got off to a rather inauspicious start. The four-time Daily Times standout girls athlete (three times as Girls Track Athlete of the Year and once a Runner of the Year in cross country) from Strath Haven injured her hip the week before she was scheduled to leave for Rice University.
The injury sidelined her for four weeks and delayed her collegiate debut until mid-October. Once healthy, though, Forbes quickly showed she belonged on the national stage.
She finished third at the Bronco Invitational at Santa Clara in a 6,000-meter personal best time of 20:26.30. It was the beginning of a freshman year not even someone with her impressive resume could have imagined.
Forbes finished fifth at the Conference USA championships and sixth in the South Central Region championship to become just the second freshman female in Rice history to qualify for the NCAA cross country championships. She finished 87th in a field of 254, and carried that over to the indoor season where she was just one of two freshmen to qualify for the NCAA championships in the 3,000 meters.
Along the way she set five personal bests, two in cross country and three during the indoor track season before her freshman year was cut short by the coronavirus pandemic.
“I was not expecting to get as many PRs as I had,” said Forbes, who is majoring in kinesiology. “I was pleasantly surprised.”
Forbes is no stranger to success. She’s a nine-time state medalist, eight in track and one in cross country. She won the 800 and anchored Strath Haven’s 4 x 800-meter relay team to its first victory at the PIAA championships as a senior. She also was on the 4 x 400 relay that took fifth.
As a junior, Forbes took second in the 800 and was on the 4 x 8 that won silver. She earned a silver in the 4 x
8 and a sixth in the 4 x 4 as a sophomore and bronze in the
4 x 8 as a freshman.
Forbes did not run cross country until her senior season and finished third at the District 1 championships and
24th at the state meet. She was the Daily Times Athlete of the Year in track as a junior and senior and the Runner of the Year in cross country as a senior.
Her biggest success as a collegiate freshman, however, came in an event she never expected – the 3,000.
“I thought I was an
800-meter runner or a miler,” she said. “I guess I’ve moved up.”
Strath Haven coach Bill Coren could have told you that. He foresaw Forbes as a
3,000- or 5,000-meter runner and he turned out to be correct.
In her first collegiate indoor race Forbes won the
3,000 at the Leonard Hilton Invitational in a personal best time of 9:27.19. Less than a month later Forbes ran 9:13.64 to win the 3,000 at the Charlie Thomas Invitational at Texas A&M.
“I think the 3,000 is what surprised me the most,”
Forbes said. “I got a PR by more than a minute the first time I ran it. That’s always a good thing.”
At her first C-USA indoor championships, Forbes won the mile in a career-best time of 4:40.05 and the 3,000 in 9:21.19 to earn Freshman of the Meet honors and qualify for the NCAA indoor championship, where she was seeded eighth in the field of 16.
The championships, though, were canceled before she arrived.
“We were boarding our plane when the announcement came that the championships were canceled,” Forbes said. “So we deboarded and went back home.”
There was a silver lining. At least she was already in Houston
“I would have been really disappointed if I was there and it was canceled,” Forbes said.
With the outdoor season canceled and classes switched to remote learning, Forbes hoped to run at the Penn Relays last week, but that hope was dashed when the oldest relay carnival in the country announced in March that the event would not take place this year.
Rice normally goes to the Drake Relays, which are held the same weekend as the Penn Relays, but Forbes said she hopes to run at Penn at least once before her collegiate career is over.
“I asked my coach and he said one out of four years you’ll be there,” Forbes said.
With everything on hold, Forbes’ plan is to take some online classes over the summer and do her best to stay in shape and be ready for her sophomore season.
“I’m doing a lot of long runs,” Forbes said. “I’ve increased my mileage a lot. There’s not any point to train super hard right now because there’s no races for the foreseeable future and I don’t want to burn myself out.”