By Justin Gaymon // Header Image by Karthik Adimula

New York, March 10, 2015 - Over the past four years, Marco Pompilj has built a reputation as one of New York City’s best high school runners. He ended this past cross country season with an impressive 14:56.06 personal best in the 5k that ranked him within the nation’s top 20 and went on to win the two-mile in 9:24.10 during December’s EmblemHealth Hispanic Games for the second year in a row. But there’s more to Pompilj than running.

On top of balancing a rigorous academic schedule at Collegiate School, Pompilj describes his interests to include environmental sciences, creating music, drawing and exploring the unique city that he calls home.

“Being in the city you’re exposed to so many different things,” said Pompilj, who lives in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. “Nobody forces you to take one aspect of your life and make that everything.”

(Some of the artwork that Pompilj has recently created)

Pompilj also attributes some of his uniqueness to having spent much of his early childhood living in Italy with his mother and father, who are of Chinese and Italian decent.

“For now I’m still young and exploring what I like,” said Pompilj. “Some can argue that it might take away from my focus on the track, but I think you can make it work if you find a good balance and have a good attitude about it. Plus, I think it’s better for kids to be creators rather than just consumers.”

Though his creative side is as much a part of his life as ever, Pompilj is currently focused on the DMR and 4xMile at this year’s New Balance Nationals Indoors, taking place at the Armory on March 13-18^th.

“For the DMR we’re going to take a shot at being All-American,” said Pompilj. “We were half a second off outdoor last year in the 4xMile, so we’d love to see if we can finally make All-American.”

“We’ve been coming to The Armory since seventh grade,” added Pompilj’s teammate, Will Ziebold. “We’ve since then talked about coming to Nationals and doing well and being All-American, maybe even win. Who knows?”

Outside of the relays, Pompilj currently favors the 1500m and mile, but anticipates moving up to the 3k once he starts school at Dartmouth College next year.

When asked if he’s thought about running professionally for USA or Italy after Dartmouth Pomilj replied: ”At the moment I don’t have any plans of running pro, but it’s something I’ll keep in the back of mind going into college.”