Cross Country, Track
Favorite athlete: Mo Farah
Favorite team: Philadelphia Eagles and U.S. National Track & Field
Favorite memory competing in sports: Qualifying for the 2016 PIAA State Cross Country Championship meet at districts as a team.
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: I am one of the least photogenic runners there is. I am always captured either with my tongue out or my hair looking like Alfalfa.
Music on mobile device: Alternative
Future plans: Attend college, run at the collegiate level, and become a business owner.
Words to live by: “Sometimes we are so busy adding up our troubles that we forget to count our blessings.”
One goal before turning 30: Travel to a Third World country and help those in need.
One thing people don’t know about me: My real name is Dewey, a family name.
By Ed Morrone
Ben Bunch has never been the fastest runner or strongest athlete. By his own admission, he’s not the most naturally gifted student either.
That isn’t to say Bunch isn’t skilled in the classroom or as a member of Central Bucks West’s cross country, indoor and outdoor track teams. Far from it, in fact. He just recognizes his own limitations and is willing to compensate for where he may feel deficient by exhaustively working at his many crafts.
Bunch attacks everything he does with vigor, zeal and determination, completely maximizing his biggest strength: his ability and willingness to outwork you. He’s the last kid to ever try to skate by on talent alone, because he knew if he did he would only be shortchanging his own potential.
“I’m not the fastest guy,” the West senior said. “My mom was an athlete in high school, but I don’t really have those genes. I was never the fastest runner or the smartest kid in class, but the way I was raised, my parents just always instilled in me that there was someone better than me out there, so I had to put in 100 percent effort to the things I cared about.
“I know I have to put in extra time on my own, whether it’s training for cross country or studying for hours and going to tutors for school. I’m willing to take the time and always ask questions, and I’ll try as hard as anyone else. It’s what I’ve taken from both my parents and the sport of running.”
Like most kids, Bunch didn’t always possess such unwavering self-confidence. He had to find his niche first. He ran track at Tohickon Middle School in Doylestown, but soccer was his first love. In fact, Bunch played soccer his freshman year at CB West in favor of cross country but soon found out that while he had the speed part down, his soccer skills were a step below his teammates and the rest of the competition. As a result, he spent a good chunk of time on the bench.
Since speed was Bunch’s strongest asset, he decided to go out for track that spring. He was nervous at first to leave his friends on the soccer team behind for an uncertainty, but with some nudging and convincing from head coach Greg Wetzel, Bunch decided to stick with it.
“I haven’t regretted it since,” he said.
Although Bunch had never run cross country before, his spring track experience led him to that program, also coached by Wetzel (who coaches indoor track at West in the winter as well). Bunch was immediately accepted by his teammates, who took him under their wings and fortified within him that he had made the right decision choosing competitive running over soccer.
“It’s such a community, our program and our sport,” Bunch said. “Nobody you ever meet will ever understand why we run a 10- or 11-mile run for fun, but other runners get it. When I was a sophomore, the team made me feel at home right away. I tried to emulate that later on to encourage the younger guys below me. Having that role really made me fall in love with what I was doing.”
Bunch was one of seven varsity runners on West’s cross country team and consistently scored, helping the Bucks go undefeated in league play in all of his three seasons.
On top of Bunch’s speed, Wetzel said his runner possesses a unique kind of leadership ability, the kind of maturity that’s unexpected in most 17-year-old kids.
“Ben is an outstanding communicator,” Wetzel said. “He is very fast, but he’s also always looking to make sure everyone is included. Cross country is such a hard sport if you don’t feel part of the team. It can get lonely. There’s a steep learning curve when you get started and he communicates what he’s learned and how to do things the right way to the underclassmen. He’s someone who is leaving the program as a senior better than he found it as a sophomore.
“He makes it a priority to make everyone feel part of it. He celebrates the successes of all of his teammates, even if they are small ones. He is able to find a way to pump up the younger guys and get them to buy in. That kind of extra effort to prioritize how his teammates are doing is just as important as his performance in the races.”
Bunch is quick to deflect praise back to his parents, coaches and past and present teammates, all of whom have showed him how to do things the right way. All he did was listen and follow their example, and in turn, a deep layer of selflessness was born.
“Cross country may seem like an individual sport but really it’s one big unit that functions as a whole,” Bunch said. “I wasn’t ever the fastest, but guys still encouraged me as if I was. It’s not like how it is in football or basketball where there’s one guy on the team who runs the show. Everyone matters, and knowing that made us care even more about what we were doing and respect one another more.
“If someone didn’t do his best that day, I wanted to be the first person to be offering comfort and encouragement, because that’s how it was for me when I got started. It’s a grueling, taxing sport where it’s easy to get down on yourself. It helps having people there for you.”
The unselfishness, the team-first attitude - all of it has served Bunch well. Just because the Bucks almost never lose in cross country, that was no reason to rest on their laurels; rather, that success allowed Bunch and his teammates to keep raising the bar and never letting themselves feel satisfied, no matter how great the accomplishment.
During winter track, the 3k run is Bunch’s specialty, a race in which he currently ranks seventh in the state and one he deeply hopes to earn a medal in at states in February. When he fell short of qualifying for last year’s state championships at Penn State, Bunch was asked to lead off the 1200m relay medley. He was terrified in the days leading up to the race, especially given the importance of the lead runner in a relay race — a bad start by Bunch could set the whole team back. And while the team fell just short of medaling, Bunch ran a personal record when his team needed him most.
“I learned to never be afraid to step outside my comfort zone,” he said. “The rewards can be amazing and unexpected.”
To classify Bunch as just an athlete would be selling him short. In addition to running competitively throughout the year, Bunch has worked doggedly to stand out both in the classroom and outside of it.
He’s his class treasurer at West, something he decided to try out for after doing student council in middle school. It’s another way for him to be a school leader outside of being an athlete, and his duties include organizing funding for school functions, filling out reimbursement forms following events, and so forth. It’s not necessarily glamorous work, but that’s not why he does it.
“It’s rewarding because while I am doing it for myself in a way to put on my college applications, but I also am doing it for everyone at my school so that they can see some of those same rewards that I do,” he said.
Bunch is also a member of the National Honor Society, a platform he uses to ring donation bells for The Salvation Army or volunteer his time at afterschool programs to help kids with their homework.
Not stopping there, Bunch also volunteers at A Woman’s Place in Doylestown, advertised on its official website as the only domestic violence organization in Bucks County. There, Bunch often spends time babysitting kids who he says “may have not grown up in the best family environment.” Since he considers himself one of the lucky ones in that respect, Bunch finds it important to pay it forward.
“It makes me feel good knowing what I’m doing might help someone who isn’t as fortunate as me,” he said. “It’s something I don’t take for granted. Sure, my friends and family are so valuable to me and I do spend free time with them too, but at the same time, if I can volunteer with NHS or A Woman’s Place or spend extra time on my treasurer duties, I know someone might be better off than if I hadn’t. And I love helping.”
Spend time talking to Bunch and you’ll quickly forget you’re talking to a young man who hasn’t even turned 18 yet. The plethora of challenges he’s taken on — athletically, academically and his extracurricular activities — will prepare him and then some for college and whatever comes beyond it.
Bunch knows he wants to run in college and that he wants to study business, in part because his parents are small business owners and also because there are many different routes you can take with a degree in business. He’s gone on some official visits and targets Saint Joseph’s University as his top choice, but will be happy at any school where he can run, challenge himself academically and be involved in the university’s community.
“If you asked me if I’d ever have the potential or even be able to consider being a Division I athlete a few years ago, I would have laughed in your face,” Bunch said. “It’s a lot of work and time, especially in college, but I was surrounded by that high expectation environment in high school. Half the battle of college is finding your people to surround yourself with, and while it’s scary leaving friends behind, I feel like I’ve already experienced it. So, it’s comforting to me to know there’s potential to be part of that again, and I really want to keep running to continue that team aspect.”
In the almost four years since Wetzel has known Bunch, it’s easy for the coach to see his pupil finding success in college and ultimately, the ‘real world.’
“He will be successful because he knows hard work matters,” Wetzel said. “He understands hard work and grit are more important than just getting by on talent alone. When the going gets tough, Ben doesn’t back down. As a great communicator, he has built strong relationships with people around him and can lean on them when life does get tough. He digs in on everything and is not content to be a bystander.”
And while it’s safe to say that Bunch is way more than just an athlete, it’s also fair to label running as the catalyst for his personal awakening. To his recollection, joining spring track freshman year, and, to a greater extent, cross country as a sophomore, is the first time he really stepped out of his comfort zone. Now, he has an insatiable appetite to challenge himself seemingly every day in everything that he does.
The results have been mesmerizing.
“Seeing how all the pieces have fallen together, I’m so grateful I made the decision to run instead of playing soccer,” Bunch said. “With all of the lessons I’ve learned, it’s just amazing how things can work out. It’s all about how far you’re willing to go for the things you want. Keep pushing, no matter what.”
