Binghamton's Erik Van Ingen had a stellar 2009 outdoor track season. The underclassman made it all the way to the USA Championships, where he failed to make the final, but still locked down a 1,500-meter personal-best time of 3 minutes, 43.18 seconds in his sophomore outdoor season. At the America East Cross Country Championships this past weekend, Van Ingen took the individual title. With his eyes set on making it to the NCAA Championships at Terre Haute, let's see if Van Ingen can reach his goal!

What are your individual goals for this season?

Originally the plan was to get to Terre Haute on the 23^rd. That's the biggest plan. I've got to make it there as an individual, which is pretty tough. Pretty much, if I get there, that's the biggest thing. My coach and I have been tossing around the phrase “All-American”. We really don't know 100% what I'm capable of. It's pretty vague what I'm hoping to accomplish this fall. If I can get to the NCAA meet, than that's the priority.

It's a lot easier to assess and set your goals as far as track is concerned.

That's just solely because of the consistent nature of track. You don't really have that in cross. With me, just with cross, it's tough to tell because I've come such a long way since last January and February to now. I'm pretty much a different runner, so it's hard to gauge how much I'm improving really. That's another thing that's really throwing everything off as to what I'm able to do.

That's got to be exciting too! Like you don't know your own bounds.

God, it's cool! It's really cool! I like to know things for sure, but it's really good at the same time.

">What are your team goals?

We're hoping to get top seven, as strange of a number as that might sound. That's just where we can see ourselves finishing if we run well. For the past couple of years for our team, it's been a huge transition. Two years ago, our program was basically a joke and it was bad. It's come a long way. Now we're a team that, you know, we get some attention on the East Coast. Hopefully we can continue the trend to where we can be a team that can be noticed on a national stage. That's to be determined. We could be one of those obscure teams that's known for cross country, like an American type.

Why did you decide to go to college—I just did this on Google Maps—27 miles away from where you went to high school?

My whole school-picking process was pretty screwed up. In high school, I was into running, but it wasn't my everything like it is now. In high school, I was a big skier and it was main sport. Originally, I was planning on skipping college to pursue a professional career in skiing. My parents were pretty against that and I wised up. An education will hopefully help me out later on. I ended up going to school at Canisius College out in Buffalo. They offered scholarship money and only had cross country. I was able to get money and only obligated to run during the fall and the summer. As far as trying to ski, that was good. At the end of my senior year was when I really started running well. The next six months after that was a bit of a transition stage in figuring out what I wanted to do. That's when I figured out that running is what I wanted to do. And that's when I transferred. The fact that it's 27 miles away from home is pretty much coincidence. I looked at a couple of schools out west. For schools on the East Coast, it was Binghamton and Syracuse. I ended up coming to Binghamton just because I was a little scared of going to a program where I wasn't the big dog. At my high school program I was a big fish in a small pond. That's what I was comfortable with. Also academics played into the decision a bit. It was a coincidence that it was that close. Actually, at the time, my mom was a graduate student in the nursing program. So, I went to school with my mom for some amount of time. Although I never saw her on campus.

You couldn't carpool with her?

There's no chance in hell that I'd carpool with my mom to college.

Was there a split decision for you where you're like, “OK, here it is. Running or skiing?” A quick decision or a gradual process?

It was so long. In high school, my coach couldn't understand why I was so adamant against not running indoor track and skiing. I think it was because he saw I had a lot of talent and wanted to see me succeed. He was always pounding it in my head to give running a try. It was a fragile process. I remember being in Canisius and being on the phone with my high school coach and one thing he said just turned my switch. It was a culmination of a long time of having to make this decision. The light just turned on upstairs. It was like, “this is it!” And ever since then it's been like, “I made my decision.” And I try not to b*tch and complain about it. (Link to Erik's ski promo video)

What were doing in high school? Were you a low-mileage guy who was just really talented?

I was trained really well. My high school coach knew his stuff for sure. During the summers, I'd go out for runs and during my senior year, I'd peak at 70 miles. But, throughout cross, I'd maintain at about 50. During the summer, I'd just do some cruise intervals, some reps...similar to the Daniels stuff. That was pretty much a frame for a lot of my high school training. I wouldn't run a step from Thanksgiving weekend to the first day of track practice. Then in the spring my coach would just race me into shape and for the first month, month and a half, I'd feel like garbage. All of a sudden, I'd feel good. Since I came to college, my coach here is pretty conservative, I guess, in her approach. I spent the majority of my freshman year and some of my sophomore cross country year kind of butting heads with her. I guess I'm pretty aggressive with my running and my approach with training. I ran into a scenario where I was not listening to her very much and over training and running too hard on my runs and all that junk. Last indoor season is when I finally gave into her advice and started running really well. As far as mileage, last year I was 70-75. This year I'm between 80-85. It's a pretty normal training layout. In the fall, it's 40-minute tempo runs and V02 stuff. It's pretty basic stuff.

Interview interrupted by my dog, Maddy, playing with her squeakiest toys right next to me.

Do you go by any interesting nicknames or anything like that?

Pretty much just, “Van Ingen”. In high school, a couple of guys called me “Sanchez”. That was because I'd come back from skiing trips and have a dirty-a*s ski-goggle tan and it looked like I had a dirty, Mexican beard. They thought it was pretty funny. It stuck through high school and even when I'd go home for break, people still call me it. Other than that, it's just my last name.

What do you and your teammates do for fun in Binghamton?

Fun things in Binghamton (laughs)? I joke around and say it's a lot like purgatory. It's not bad, but it's not like Miama, Florida. We do pretty normal stuff. I'm pretty low-key during the season. After a workout recently we went apple picking. We play video games...Super Smash Bros and Call of Duty. Last semester I had Xbox Live and it was like, “game over!” My roommates discovered the Nazi zombie and it was just too much fun. Typical college kid stuff. Whatever we can find to do when we're not practicing or studying.

You vaguely mentioned not knowing your own bounds. Do you have any long-term goals in mind?

Oh, yeah. Everyone's got goals and ambitions and dreams and stuff. I'd like to have a shot at winning an NCAA title on the track before I leave Binghamton. I'll be sticking around through 2012, taking a fifth year. I'd like to run professionally and make a World Championship or Olympic team. As ridiculous as that sounds, I think I have a lot of upside. I've only been training as—I don't want to say a world-class runner— an elite runner for the past year and a half or so. Hopefully that stuff will happen, because honestly I don't want to do much else than run and I sure as hell don't want to get a real job after college.

With those types of runners coming out of the bigger programs, do you feel like it's going to be harder for you to accomplish what you want to accomplish?

It doesn't phase me. I just think that I don't really give a sh*t about that too much. I have all the contacts and stuff within our school. We just had a pole vaulter sign a contract with Asics about a year and a half ago.

Was that Quiller?

Yeah, that was Rory. Our coach is familiar with what needs to be done with all that and stuff. It's nice to have someone who's been there to help out with the process. That kind of stuff just motivates me and lights a fire under me. Throughout my running career, a lot of people have underestimated me and that's really gotten me really stoked and got me training so I can run my butt off. It's ideal for me in that aspect.

If you could have one meal, prepared by anyone, what would you have and who would make it?

I would have my mom make a Shoefly Pie. That's what I'd have.

Can you explain that one for us?

I sure can. Everyone seems to think I'm making that one up or something. It's like a Pennsylvania-Dutch sort of thing. It's molasses and brown sugar and I don't know what else, but it's just heavy and rich and sweet. My mom will make it every now and then as a treat. Whenever she makes it, it's gone pretty quickly and I kind of regret how quickly it's gone. I'm usually on the couch and in a considerable amount of pain.

Can you give a crazy running-related story?

When I was at Canisius we were doing one of our normal runs or whatever. And were in this Buffalo suburb to the east of Buffalo called Amherst. We were running down some neighborhood street and taking up the whole road like a bunch of jackasses. A guy driving a big Range Rover or some really big SUV drives up and is honking his horn while screaming at us. As he drives, a bunch of the guys on the team start banging on the car and stuff and he slams on the brakes and starts driving along with us as we're running and talking sh*t. His girlfriend is sitting next to him in the passenger seat, so he's got to act all tough. One of my friends gets up on the back bumper and starts climbing on top of the SUV. Our captain at the time, gets in the guy's face and they exchange some words and ends up spitting in the guy's face. It was bad, I'm surprised he didn't get try to get out and try to take out five or six scrawny runner boys. This guy was tough! He said some choice words and said that he was going to get the police. He drove off all big and bad. We never heard from him again.