Boys' Cross Country Runner of the Year: James Wood's Ethan Pratt-Perez

Over the last four cross country seasons, there has been one constant for every Virginia High School League postseason district or region meet involving Winchester-Frederick County schools — James Wood’s Ethan Pratt-Perez finishing in the Top 10.

This year, he finally got the one thing missing from his medal collection. As a result, he can now add another honor to his list of achievements.

After earning an All-State medal for the first time in his career by placing second in the Class 4 meet at Oatlands, Pratt-Perez is The Winchester Star Boys’ Cross Country Runner of the Year for the first time.

Pratt-Perez placed 68th (last) in the spring of 2021, 25th in the fall of 2021 and 38th in 2022 in state competition before this year’s breakthrough, which was one of the finest accomplishments for an area boy in a long time.

Pratt-Perez had James Wood’s best state performance since James Connelly won the Group AA title in 1997, and the best finish for any Winchester-Frederick County boys’ runner in state competition since Handley’s Bobby Lockhart won his fourth consecutive state title in 2001.

Pratt-Perez has always displayed exceptional talent, work ethic and determination, but his winning performance at the Region 4D meet and his breakthrough performance at the state meet were examples that his mental strength was better than ever this season.

“I was like, ‘I’m in a position to do well,’” said Pratt-Perez of his mindset going into the state meet. “Considering [what happened at states] the last three years, [I thought], ‘I have to have a good race here. I cannot have a bad race.’ I wasn’t thinking about anything else. I stuck with the plan through most of the race, and I performed. There was no mental deviation.”

This year’s state meet was by no means the first time Pratt-Perez was rewarded for his persistence.

When Pratt-Perez first started running cross country in seventh grade for Frederick County Middle School, he didn’t exactly have the best approach.

“I kind of struggled,” Pratt-Perez said. “I sprinted, then I would walk for a little bit, then I would sprint again.”

Inspired by his mother Amaya Perez, things would soon change for Pratt-Perez after the season. Perez became involved in distance running about a year before her son, and while training for a marathon in the summer before Ethan entered eighth grade, she invited Ethan to work with her.

“I had nothing better to do,” Pratt-Perez said. “That’s how it really started.”

Pratt-Perez’s endurance picked up dramatically, and it showed in a big way in November of 2019. In the first-ever Virginia Middle School State Championships at Pole Green Park in Mechanicsville, Pratt-Perez won the 185-runner, 4,000-meter competition with a time of 13 minutes, 44.2 seconds, three seconds faster than the runner-up.

“I did not imagine I would get to that level at some point,” Pratt-Perez said. “But I told myself when I get to my senior year, I want to do the same thing again for high school states.”

James Wood coach Matthew Lofton — an avid high-level runner who was hired in February of 2020 to take over the cross country program — didn’t have a Virginia High School League season to prepare his runners for that fall because of COVID delays. But in the summer of 2020 he was asked by Amaya Perez to train with Ethan. Though Pratt-Perez might have had big goals for the future, Lofton said the freshman had a quiet nature that seemed to suggest he didn’t realize just how strong of a runner he was.

Pratt-Perez didn’t take long to prove himself. He was the top freshman at both the Class 4 Northwestern District meet (seventh) and Region 4C meets (ninth). In the fall of 2021, he was the top sophomore at the district (fourth) and region (sixth).

One of the things that helped Pratt-Perez early in career was working with talented and hard-working runners like Chris White (class of 2021), Nathaniel Woshner (class of 2022, now at NCAA Division I Duquesne) and Liam McDonald (class of 2022, now at NCAA Division I Radford).

“Once he started competing with them, he started to see I have a talent here, and they started to see it, too,” Lofton said. “They were kind of motivating him. Nathaniel when he graduated was like, ‘My school record’s only going to last a year. Ethan’s going to get it the next year.’ Nathaniel was setting school records [in cross country and track], but he knew that Ethan had so much talent that they were going to disappear.”

As a junior, Pratt-Perez entered the year as James Wood’s most decorated runner for the first time. He broke Woshner’s school record by 12 seconds with a 3.1-mile time of 15:31.2 at the Third Battle Invitational, took second by a step to Millbrook’s Nick Hayden (now at NCAA Division I Columbia) at the Class 4 Northwestern District on the same course in a season personal record of 15:24.9, and had a fourth-place showing at the Region 4D meet.

But one year after placing 25th overall and fourth among local runners behind two seniors and a junior at the Class 4 meet at Great Meadow, Pratt-Perez placed 38th overall and eighth among local runners in 17:57 at the 2022 state meet, 88 seconds behind the area’s top two finishers in Will Pardue and Garrett Stickley of Handley.

“I think I got really nervous, and I made myself sick. Physically sick,” Pratt-Perez said. “I wanted to do well so badly that I psyched myself out.”

Lofton said he and Pratt-Perez had no intention of seeing that performance repeat itself in his senior year.

One of the ways they tried to achieve that was letting Pratt-Perez have more input in his running schedule.

For example, Pratt-Perez did not want to push himself at the Northwestern District meet. (That meet no longer counts for postseason purposes. Pratt-Perez did serve as a pacesetter for a teammate before dropping out.) He also didn’t run in as many races overall this season.

“Whatever he thinks he needs, I’m going to let him have,” Lofton said. “I think he puts a lot of pressure on himself, and I think having [too many] meets to put pressure on himself just kind of makes it worse. I let him pick and choose, and it worked out perfectly.”

“[Lofton] listens to his athletes,” Pratt-Perez said. “When they feel like maybe they can push a little bit harder or need a workout to be less hard, or if anyone is in pain, he looks out for the team’s well-being and adjusts.”

In workouts this season, Pratt-Perez’s tempo runs — runs over a certain distance that aren’t conducted at race pace but are still done relatively quickly — were 10 seconds faster than last year, which Pratt-Perez felt helped him on race days.

Pratt-Perez’s regular season included a repeat win at the season-opening Central Invitational in Woodstock. He recorded a time of 15.15.6 over three miles, 44 seconds faster than last year, to win by 20 seconds.

At the Oatlands Invitational on Sept. 23, Pratt-Perez placed sixth in 16:10, three seconds faster than last year despite rainy and windy conditions.

A week later at the Judges Classic, Pratt-Perez ran at Kernstown Battlefield for the first time in his career. In an exciting battle with Broad Run’s Tarek Benlamkaddem, the eventual Class 4 state champion, he took second, 2.5 seconds behind.

On Oct. 14, Pratt-Perez wanted to try and run under 15 minutes at Millbrook’s Third Battle Invitational. With no one pushing him from behind — the next closest runner finished 17 seconds slower — Pratt-Perez didn’t achieve that feat, but he still shattered his school record by 15 seconds to take second place. His time of 15:09.4 was 22 seconds faster than he ran at the Third Battle Invitational last year, and just eight seconds behind Oakton’s Junior Allen (third in Class 6 this year).

Pratt-Perez couldn’t have been running at a higher level heading into the Region 4D meet at Kernstown Battlefield on Nov. 1, and Lofton made sure he knew that.

“During [training] runs, anytime he would say something that didn’t have the confidence I think he needed, I would correct him. Going into the regional meet he said I just want to make it out of region,” said Lofton, laughing at the memory. “I said, ‘Ethan, no. You need to change your mindset right now. You need to think about how you’re going to win this race.’”

Pratt-Perez almost didn’t on a windy day in the low 40s. Trailing by more than 20 meters with less than 300 meters left, Pratt-Perez blazed down the downhill stretch toward the finish line and passed Jefferson Forest senior Alex Jordan with about 20 meters to go to win the title with a time of 15:59.8, 1.9 seconds ahead of Jordan.

“I honestly think that’s the best race I’ve ever seen him run,” Lofton said. “When I saw him in second place, coming off the hill ... I wasn’t thinking he was going to win. But he came by me, and I just started yelling, and everybody else is yelling, and I think he’s like, ‘I can do this.’ And he just kicked and passed Alex. Alex had nothing left. For him to win that race and fight back in those final meters, it was just amazing.”

The performance was another example of Pratt-Perez’s growth.

“It took a lot of mental strength,” Pratt-Perez said. “I was giving up on the last 200, but then I just decided I had nothing to lose, and it ended up working out.”

Lofton and assistant coach Tyler Cox-Philyaw told Pratt-Perez that the state meet could be his as well. Pratt-Perez couldn’t sustain the lead after making an aggressive move past Benlamkaddem on the steep hill leading up to the 2.5-mile mark, but his runner-up time of 15:48 was more than two minutes faster than on the same state meet course as the year before.

“I gave it my all,” Pratt-Perez said. “I just wasn’t in the shape that Tarek was in.”

Lofton was full of pride for Pratt-Perez on that day. He enjoyed working with him tremendously. Lofton runs with the members of the Colonels every day at practice.

“I’ve become really close to him in his personal life, close with his mother, his siblings, his dad,” Lofton said. “It’s going to be tough. I’m going to be missing a great athlete and a great leader in the sense of everyone looking up to him.”

— Contact Robert Niedzwiecki at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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