There’s a new kid on the block. Sonoma State’s Women’s Cross Country Freshman Gianna Bomarito didn’t waste any time, breaking a record in her first month with the team. Bomarito moved into fifth place in the program’s history in the women’s 6k with a 21:42.6 on Sept. 10.

Who did Bomarito move ahead of on the list? It was her teammate, Sophomore, Alex Boyle. Did this cause any tension among the teammates? The answer was no. Bomarito put it this way, “we’re all really supportive of each other; we’re all happy for each other for every success that we get, and I think when we’re all becoming such strong runners, we help push each other to be the best runner we can be.” 

Head Coach David Lawerence shared his thoughts on the matter, “you’ve gotta understand with Sonoma State Track and Field, and Cross Country it’s more or less like a sisterhood of girl power and things of this nature and we all root for each other and we kind of go from there, so there’s no kind of like ‘oh my god who is this?’ there is no ‘oh she’s better than me,’ there’s no riff-raff, we don’t do drama.”

Bomarito credits the early success at SSU to a few things. The first is coaching. The Fresno-native went into detail about it, “They’ve been really supportive, giving me the training that works best for me, and I feel like in such a short time span that I’ve been training with my coach, he’s really helped me get so far, and we’ve only just gotten started.”

Another thing Bomarito believes that has helped her in the early going is a tightened focus on “health and recovery”. Bomarito shared how she has improved this aspect of her training, “during high school, I didn’t put it as much of a focus, so coming into this year, I’m really holding myself to it.”

A runner of this caliber had many options when it came to school selection. Bomarito, a Fresno native shared what led to the decision, “I’m from Fresno, Calif. I went to Clovis North, and I really wanted to get out of the area and go more to like somewhere that fit me; I felt like. And when I saw Sonoma, I thought the area was really nice, and I thought it fit me and my style, and I really liked the program.” After a few months, Bomarito is not disappointed, stating, “I really like it here.”

After such an early accomplishment, resting on one’s laurels would be easy. But that’s not the case with Bomarito. The freshman runner described the mindset, “After last week, I was really happy about it but then after I really just put it in the past and then started focusing on now and what I can do in the future. Training hard, working consistently, and then really focusing on health and recovery.” This mindset is something Lawerence preaches to his athletes, “From that perspective, it’s just a matter of keeping the team focused on what we need to focus on to go from there, whether it’s a freshman coming in and running very well the first race or you know a sophomore or junior, we praise each other within our own program, and then we move on.”