Put on your running shoes if you want to keep up with Enloe High School\'s Rachel Bahler.
Of course, if you\'re trying to keep up with her on the cross country course, running shoes probably won\'t be enough.
Bahler stays on the go and was the most valuable runner on the Enloe cross country team in 2005, finishing third in the Cap Seven 4-A championships.
Running is just a small part of her life, but it is a part of her life that she cherishes because running is so objective.
\"You look at your time and see how you\'ve done,\" she said. \"I didn\'t know why I liked running so much until I figured out that it is not subjective at all.\"
Bahler (pronounced BAY-LER) started running when she was a sophomore, long after she made her theatrical debut at Hunter Elementary in the title role of \"Annie.\"
She loved the theater, and it never crossed her mind that athletics would become a part of her life.
She tried out for the Enloe lacrosse team in the spring of her freshman year because -- she said in a conspiratorial tone -- she was told it was easy to make the squad.
She took up cross country in fall 2004 because David Honea, then the Eagles\' cross country coach, told her that lacrosse coach Kevin Shanahan said she would be good at it.
\"I had to try cross country because I was excited somebody thought I could be good at something,\" she said.
That is a surprisingly self-effacing comment considering her resume, but \"one thing I have trouble with is self confidence,\" she said.
For example, when she won one of the leading roles, Amneris, in Wake County schools and Broadway Series South\'s recent production of \"Aida,\" her first reaction was, \"I can\'t do that.\"
The role required her to move her voice from B above middle C to F, five notes higher.
Naturally, she made an adjustment, and the thin, pale redhead who lathers on the sunscreen before every run got the rush of a standing ovation under the hot spotlights at Raleigh\'s Memorial Auditorium.
Among the least surprised by her success was Nick Mangum, the Enloe cross country coach who has learned not to be amazed by what Bahler accomplishes.
\"She is the type of kid who is constantly doing something,\" Mangum said. \"I don\'t know how she does it. I\'ve never seen her sit down and take a breath.\"
For the past three and a half weeks, Bahler practiced every weekday from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. for \"Aida.\"
She then dashed off to two hours of cross country practice. She worked so hard at practice, and earlier in the summer, that Mangum is confident she\'ll qualify for the state 4-A championships in the fall. She missed by seven seconds last year.
For her upcoming senior year, she is president of Enloe\'s International Thespian Society, on the executive council of the drama club, a board member of the Key Club, vice president of the National Honor Society and a student body representative to the PTSA.
She takes voice and piano lessons, gets in her daily runs, does her homework and maintains her grades.
She hasn\'t had time to check on her overall grade point average but has made all A\'s in high school except for a B last semester in Spanish III.
She also has been chosen for the all-state chorus three straight years and, last year, won a five-state National Association of Teachers of Singing competition.
A playbill bio that looks so startling in print seems really normal to her.
\"My life doesn\'t seem rushed at all to me,\" Bahler said. \"I want to be involved.\"
In fact, she is thinking of adding dancing lessons to her weekly schedule.
\"You just have to manage your time,\" she said. \"I always carry something with me in case I get a break somewhere.\"
She is making one concession to her schedule this year, though.
\"I didn\'t get much sleep last year at times, and it impeded my progress in running,\" she said. \"One of my goals for this year is to sleep more.\"