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Ostberg, who won the national championship in a 5-kilometer race in June, announced that he will continue his running career at Stanford University. He will join Stamford’s Claire Howlett, a freshman who graduated from Westhill in June, on the campus of the northern California school next year.
“I really liked the coaching staff and the school,’’ Ostberg said at the Fairfield County Sports Night in Greenwich, where he was honored as the Darien Sportsperson of the Year. “It’s a great fit.”
Ostberg will be running for coach Chris Miltenberg at Stanford, which is nationally ranked in cross country as well as track and field.
Ostberg raced to Sports Night minutes after setting a course record in the Fairfield County Interscholastic Athletic Conference cross country championships at Waveny Park in New Canaan. He won the race in 14:47 for the 5,000-meter (3.1-mile) course, breaking the previous record of 15:15 set by Ridgefield’s Trevor Hopper last year.
A lot of big meets remain, but the season could not be better for Ostberg. He won the Manhattan Invitational, becoming only the second runner to run the 2.5-mile race in under 12 minutes. He finished in 11:57.2, missing the record set in 2012 by Edward Cheserek by 1.8 seconds. Cheserek won the NCAA national championship last year as a freshman at Oregon.
Ostberg also set a meet record at a race in Vermont, smashing the existing record by 19 seconds.
Ostberg’s next race will be the Class L championships on Saturday at Wickham Park in Manchester. Darien is the defending meet champion.
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