When Mitchell Clark walks up to the starting line he believes that what happens between then and the finish line has already been decided – not by fate but by hard work.

“My mental approach to running is pretty simple,” said Clark, Canton’s outstanding cross-country runner. “The way I look at it is that when I’m on the line ready to race, there is nothing I can do right then to change the race. It is all about the work I have put in weeks prior. I am confident in my workouts and therefore confident going into my race.”

While he’s running, he said he has few thoughts and normally “locks into the jersey in front of me and then when I pass it I move to the next one.”

Usually, Clark runs out of jerseys to pass well before the finish line. Only a junior, Clark is one of the top cross-country runners in the state and runs on a very talented and young Canton team. After going to school in Germany during his freshman year, Clark joined the Canton cross country team as a sophomore and has been running hard ever since.

“Mitch is not only one of the hardest workers I have ever known, he does great in school and has a great family,” said Canton Coach Bill Boyd. “He sets goals and then works hard to achieve them.”

One of those goals was to break the school record, which he accomplished midway through the current fall season. His time of 15 minutes, 39 seconds broke his older brother Zac’s school record time of 15:58. After high school, Zac ran at the University of Alabama Huntsville and is currently the assistant coach for the Canton men's team.

Keeping the record in the family was a nice bonus for Mitchell.

“Having my brother as an assistant coach never was really weird to me because he has been ‘coaching’ me from the sidelines ever since I started running,” he said. “He has been a huge inspiration, the reason I started running and also the time I’ve been chasing from the start. Breaking his school record was very exciting. It’s been something I’ve been looking forward to my whole running career so that was definitely a highlight.”

There are other highlights to chase, including getting the team to the state finals in November at MIS.

“The team this year is amazing,” Clark said. “We are all super close and also super committed to the team and to ourselves. Everyone pushes each other through every workout, which I think is the main reason we have had success.”

Mitchell, 17, is the son of Angela and Aaron Clark and runs to a 3.75 GPA in the classroom. He also enjoys playing the piano and hanging out with friends.

But right now, he is focused on doing the work before stepping up to the starting line.

“During my time at Canton we have never had huge success until this year,” he said. “However, we had large individual improvements that I think has led to where we are today. The last time Canton went to states was in 2008. But we always have done better than we have been expected to do and we have no plans to change that this year.

“I just want to push my times further to help the team as much as I can. I want to place as high as possible at states to prove to myself that I’ve given it everything, but also to help out the team because at a meet like states, every point matters.”

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