The latest Duke Automotive-Suffolk News-Herald Player of the Week is only a freshman, but she is nonetheless excelling on the indoor track for Nansemond River High School.

At the PenSouth Conference championships on Feb. 4, Sarah Rhiel helped the Lady Warriors win their third conference team title in a row by claiming two conference individual championships.

She won the girls’ 1,000-meter run with a time of 3:11.89, qualifying her for regionals, and she also won the 3,200-meter run with a time of 12:13.84, also qualifying her for regionals.

“I think I did a great job,” Rhiel said, noting she regulated her pace, keeping her body under control to work toward her goal.

“She’s unreal, man,” Nansemond River track and field coach Justin Byron said.

Rhiel has had a remarkable impact on the school’s distance running program from the start of the indoor season.

“She’s a pleasure and a blessing to coach,” Byron said. “I’ve never had someone smile as much as her. She’s always happy, she has not complained once. She’s at one point held every distance record at our school, and again, that’s with her first chance running it.”

“I don’t think our (girls’) 4×800 has ever cleared a state-qualifying mark,” Byron said, speaking for his time as coach. “The girls have made it to states, but it was off of place. This is the first time our girls’ 4×800 has hit a (state-)qualifying mark, and she was on that team.”

Also in Byron’s time at NR, Rhiel is the “first distance runner to ever qualify for states. She’s done that in her first race as a freshman.”

“It’s funny, but I had some experience running before this track season, and I just thought I could just step it up to the next level and perform great,” Rhiel said.

She said her running experience began when she was very little.

Her parents would run, and “my dad would carry me half the time,” she said.

Her father, Joe Rhiel recalled those times, running with his wife Yasymne Rhiel and pushing little Sarah in a jogger stroller. Then, Sarah would get out and run for brief periods of time.

When she was around the ages of 5 and 6, she would do one-mile runs.

“She was just a very active person and just loved to run,” Joe Rhiel said.

Sarah Rhiel said, “As I grew, I started doing 5Ks, just for fun.”

She ran with the Tidewater Striders for a season at the age of 12.

After starring for the Nansemond River field hockey team in the fall of 2015, she said she opted to join the indoor track team through the influence of her friends.

Watching Rhiel’s success on the track, marked most recently by her performance on Feb. 4, Joe Rhiel said, “My wife and I were very surprised. We knew she could run for distance, we just never thought that she’d be at this level as a freshman.”