High 5: Northside’s Andrew Harding signs to run cross country, track at UNC Charlotte

Published 12:40 am Monday, January 20, 2025

By Jason O. Boyd

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YEATESVILLE, N.C. — Andrew Harding has had the support of friends, classmates, family and teammates during his high school cross country and track career at Northside High School. Now, he’ll take all of that with him to the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Harding signed his letter of intent to be a member of the 49ers. In addition to that support, he carries a ton of medals, trophies, and other accomplishments. That includes the Class 1-A individual cross country title, which he won after his record-setting run last fall.

“I am just so proud of him and what he’s done for our team,” Northside cross country and track coach Casey Schulte said as she teared up. “Sorry. I’ve been calling it the Andrew effect.

“I talked to his mom about it, but he continuously is so humble and such a quiet leader and continues to lead our other runners who are still running, even over the winter. I mean, he’s giving advice. He’s talking about shoes, but I’m so excited to see what’s in store for him.

“I don’t think he’s going to be done after college. And so I’m so excited to see not only how he continues running, but the mark that he’s going to continue to make on the world.”

Andrew talked about his college decision, gearing up for spring track and preparing for college.

1. How does it feel to have signed with UNC Charlotte?

“It’s just like an accomplishment, like, you know, a sense of like, I did it. I finally made it. It’s like four years. Four years of hard work is, you know, it’s a lot. So to see it actually come into something, it feels great.”

2. Obviously you can be successful running anywhere, but it sounds like Charlotte and their engineering department was kind of the thing that maybe added a little bit of extra effort. for you.

“Yeah, Charlotte, they have a lot of guys on their team that do engineering, and they’ve all said that it’s definitely possible, and having that many people to work with if you need help, it helps a lot. So, yeah, I’m definitely going to go in for engineering and see how it works out.”

3. Have you been able to sit back and kind of look at all of it and appreciate what you’ve done?

“I feel like not really, not yet. It hasn’t really set in yet. I’ve still got the rest of indoor (track) season and outdoor (track) season.

“So I feel like towards the end of outdoor season it will definitely start to set in. I’m getting to the end of high school. So I have college to look forward to. But, yeah, I haven’t really looked back. (2:26) I don’t know the word. (2:27) I haven’t really looked back on all of it yet.”

4. You’ve been running in other events and such. So what have you been doing between cross country and the start of track to keep you busy and in shape?

“Yeah, I’ve just still been running consistent mileage, staying consistent in a lot of things. But indoor season, I’m not really focused on running fast in indoor, like top-end speed. It’s more of like a building block for outdoor season.

“The focus is on that, obviously. But, yeah, I’m still going to go to indoor states to see if I can win one of those events, mile or two. Just building for outdoor season.”

5. I’m assuming you’ll still have connections with all the guys that you run with, the ladies that you run with and such. What can you tell them about what they can do?

“Just stay consistent and continue to want to get better. Like me, it hasn’t always been easy. There’s been times that I don’t want to run. I didn’t want to do it at all. But I just keep doing it. I push through. I want to be good at it. I want to be great at it. It’s just like if you want to be great at anything, you have to just keep doing it and stay consistent. It’s just one of those things.

“You just have to want it. There’s only so much I can do versus someone else actually wanting to be great.”

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