PARKVIEW'S AIDEN MONISTERE COMPETES INTHE ARCADIA INVITATIONAL EARLIER THIS YEAR
What an incredible few days it has been for Parkview Baptist's Aiden Monistere, who closed out his high school with a national championship at the New Balance Outdoor Nationals. As if that wasn't enough, today, Gatorade named Monistere their 2025 Louisiana Player Of The Year.
Franklin Field in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania was the setting on last Friday when a ferocious kick won the boys' championship two-mile event. Monistere, who ran a 56 second final lap, won with a time of 8:52.
Monistere had options on where to compete for the final time as a high school athlete, he opted for the New Balance Nationals and historic Franklin Field.
"I just wanted to race against the best, and I knew that the best were going to be there," Monistere said. "Big thanks to Mrs. Chris for getting me out there. She kind of recruited me to it. Eugene is special. It's Hayward, but Penn is a different place. I had not been there before. I knew going there I would be treated like a king. You are treated like a professional athlete and that was amazing."
What made is national championship even sweeter is that it followed what he called "the worst race of my life" at the Brook PR Invitational where he ran a 4:19.24.
"I was extremely down after that race, but having coaches and teammates around me to support me really helped out," Monistere said. "That's really the reason I went to New Balance. I was ready to be done. I thought I was burned out, but it ended up working out. Was I expecting a national championship? Not at all...to win a national title and bring it back to Louisiana. It's special."
Usually, Monistere is one to do his homework on his competition leading up to a big race. That was not the case this time around.
"The homework this time was watching the movie Cars the day of," Monistere said. "I have raced these guys before. I knew who they were."
Except for one...Canadian Brody Clark.
"He is incredible. Set a national record as a junior. I knew he was going to have a kick," Monistere said. "I had a friend who is Canadian to do some research on him. He was scary--not knowing him specifically."
The pace during the championship was pedestrian for much of the first half. During the early portion of the second half of the race, Monistere would run out in lane--avoiding any possibility of the getting tripped or boxed in. While the lead pack thinned, Monistere would stay within a comfortable striking distance before beginning his kick with 500 meters to go.
Tamrat Gavenas, who will be going to Harvard in the Fall where he will be a teammate of Jesuit's Brady Mullen, went with Monistere, went with Monistere, who glanced over his right shoulder on a couple of occasions to check on his competition. But Gavenas was not able to match Monistere's kick, in which Monistere displayed his signature clenched teeth.
Mullen finished nineth with a time of 9:01. It's the third fastest outdoor two-mile time in Louisiana history behind Monistere and Salmen's Bobby Beck.