Joshua Shields '21 Recruiting Profile

           During the my High School years my leadership skills have soared to great extents. I started in Civil Air Patrol where I was promoted to a staff sergeant and later a technical sergeant where I taught drill and helped teach leadership lessons to other airmen. I was a Team Leader at Chik-fil-A for 2 years as well. My Leadership was later put to the test when I was made Team Captain of my Cross Country team where I helped my teammates achieve there personal records and inspired them to be better athletes everyday. I lead my team by winning 5 large meets of the season.  What makes me different from other recruits is my dedication and discipline in my training. Coming from a small team, with limited coaching, I often designed my own workouts. This discipline and ownership has paid off as  I qualified individually to run at states where I finished with a new personal record of 17:32. The discovery of running late in my high school career has driven me to work as hard as ever. In track and field 2020 I was running the mile consistently in the 4:50s until the season was cancelled in March due to COVID 19.  However, this has not stopped me from studying the sport and training strategically for the fall season. Right now I am logging over 50 miles per week and meet with several premier college runners to do interval and speedwork. My academics have consisted of a rigorous classical courseload where I excel  in writing and history. I started dual enrollment college classes at Broward College and have set my sites on a 4:30 mile and 16:30 5K next year. This summer I have already started training harder and smarter.  My extraordinary dedication to running and academics defines me, and I am as ready as ever to return after the quarantine to take high school cross country and track by storm  in my senior year and earn a scholarship run for a college team.