A MODEL OF CONSISTENCY

Ultra competitive. A ferocious worker. Mentally tenacious. And, of course, overflowing with talent.

Those are descriptions that tend to pop up when the topic of conversation turns to Erin Hegarty.

Not that you would ever hear the Hanford junior talk about herself in such ways -- or in any way, really.

Ask her about running at the 3A state cross country meet -- she finished 10th as a freshman and sixth as a sophomore -- and she'll tell you what it was like to qualify as a team.

Ask her about her goals for this season, about being the most experienced runner on the team instead of its youngest talent, and she talks about what a great job Lauren Curran and Breanna Daniel are doing leading the team as seniors.

In short, Hegarty -- who will be in action Saturday at the Richland Invitational at Carmichael Middle School -- runs away from attention with the same dogged determination she uses to run down opponents.

"She's very genuine," said her coach, Sean Mars. "From the very beginning, Erin has been sincere. She genuinely loves working with the other gals, and she was very excited that in her first two years, she was able to be on a team that went to state. Those things are very special to her."

As is she to the Falcons' program.

From the start, Hegarty has been the team's No. 1 runner, even when she joined a veteran squad that included talented runners Haley Tank, Megan Dart and Leilani Anderson, all of whom graduated last spring. As a freshman on the track team, she set the school record in the 3,200 meters.

"She delivered," said Curran, who was an established sophomore on the cross country squad when Hegarty arrived. "We were glad to have her and we built from that."

"She always has a positive outlook on the team," Daniel added. "She encourages everyone."

The Falcons won their first regional in 2007 and finished second last year, and their sixth-place finish at state last fall was their best since 1988.

On the individual front -- knock on wood against injuries -- Hegarty will finish this season as the program's most accomplished runner based on state, regional and district finishes. And she still has a senior season to go.

How does Hegarty explain so much success in a sport she picked up as an eighth-grader? Well, in the same gracefully humble way those who know her would expect.

"I just love to run," she said. "I'm so thankful that I have the ability to run. A lot of people don't get to experience that.

"There's something pure about it. I sounds cheesy, but I love the line from Chariots of Fire, when Eric Liddell says, 'When I run, I feel God's pleasure.' "

Hegarty's family has always enjoyed sports. Her father, Tom, is Hanford's athletic director. Her mother, Amy, played tennis in college and began running to stay in shape afterward. She still runs marathons -- PR'd in Portland on Sunday -- and got Erin started.

Mars said she has become a serious student of the sport in her few short years.

"Her form has continued to improve," he said. "She does look at times like she's just floating -- it's beautiful to watch. She has strength, an ability to process oxygen that's impressive, and she's gritty. She loves to compete."

Keith Jolley, who leads the boys team and is the distance coach for track, has a glowing opinion of Hegarty as well.

"This is my 20th year coaching," he said. "I've coached team state champions and individual state champions. Male or female, she is one of the top three mentally tough runners I've ever coached. And she is absolutely the most coachable athlete I've ever coached. She will believe and do anything a coach asks. If we tell her to run backwards while drinking a milkshake, she'll do it if it will lower her time.

"What makes you love her even more is that she's so humble. She's a better person than she is a runner. I would say the same nice things about her if her best time in the mile was 18 minutes. She has her priorities straight. I stopped worrying about her a year and a half ago if she could handle good races and bad races. That's No. 4 in her life."

Behind God, family and school, said the girl who teaches second-grade Sunday school.

Her coaches have no doubt she could go on to run in college. Hegarty, who wants to do something in medicine, said she's not worried about that yet.

For that matter, she's not worried about how she'll do at state this year, either.

"Day by day, race by race, whatever happens, happens," she said. "I just trust my team, trust God, and I'll go out and race my best race."