Twins that run together stay together. Bianca and Alejandra Frausto do a lot of things together and cross country and track and field are some of them. They are both 2016 graduates of North High School in Bakersfield and helped lead their team to win the cross country championship.

Besides being identical twins, they are so identical that they both go to CSU Bakersfield, are majoring in psychology, want to go to graduate school, and continue running.

Bianca Frausto started running at CSU Northridge, but later transfered to CSUB. At CSUB she placed second in her heat, 5000-meter race, with a personal best and is number 18 on the depth chart. She was not into running until high school when a security guard saw her running the mile during her physical education class. He told her to join cross country and at the time she had no idea what cross country was.

“I started running my sophomore year of high school, so I am a pretty new runner. You run a little bit when you’re younger in elementary school or middle school, but taking it serious[ly] and competitively, I started sophomore year of high school. Then it kind of just went from there. I know a lot of other people have been running for like ten years, but we’ve only been running for about four,” said Bianca.

Her favorite memory was her junior year of high school when her team won the valley championships and went to state. This was the first time ever in 14 years that this had happened.

“It was just really nice to break a losing streak. It took a lot of hard work, we literally just slept and ran that whole summer and that was it. We had no social life. We would just go to practice, go to summer school, go to sleep, go to practice, eat, repeat. There was nothing else,” said Bianca.

After graduating from CSUB, Bianca wants to continue both her education and sports.

“I plan to go to graduate school. I want to go to graduate school here because I do have a fifth year for my sport and I would love to run for Marcia [her coach] another year,” said Bianca.

The twins are very dedicated to cross country as they train all week.

“Our training process is six days a week of running. We run about eight miles a day. Sometimes we’ll do some swimming and some running. We lift twice a week and then we’ll do a long run on Saturday anywhere from 10 to 12 miles,” said Bianca.

Not all of their training involves running. There are some days they don’t run and swim, so that they still get the workout while their bodies rest at the same time.

“We use aqua joggers, so the thing about it is you can get the intensity of running and the intensity of working out without a lot of impact on your knees because a lot of injuries for runners are like knees or shins,” said Bianca.

When it comes to having a diet, the twins really don’t have a specific one, but they do meal prep.

“I feel like we don’t have a diet just because if you want to indulge in a piece of cake and you had a hard day you deserve the piece of cake,” said Bianca. “We like tortilla chips. We’re Mexican so we love any kind of tortillas. We’ll usually wake up early and I’ll make breakfast and she’ll make lunch. So we just make sure that we have at least three meals a day for sure with some snacks sometimes.”

Although they are twins who both do cross country, they do not compete with each other. They use each other to push one another.

“We’re not competitive. When one starts pushing, the other one has to push. She motivates me, its like if AJ can do that then I can do that or if I can do this then she can do that,” said Bianca.

Alejandra Frausto was on the depth chart in three events in track and field and two event in cross country. Her favorite events in cross country are the 5k and 10k.

Her breakthrough moment happened last season when the coach took her and teammate Angel Valdez to UCLA and she was trying to break her personal record. She said that the girls were going too slow, so she just took off.

“I started running faster and it was very hard for me to be that aggressive and that competitive with these girls that I felt like were better than me. So I got out and did what I needed to do and I ended up breaking 18, that’s my personal record, it’s a 17.58. It was just that moment there that I was like I did what I wanted to do,” said Alejandra.

Like Bianca, Alejandra plans to get into the graduate program and continue running.

“With coach, I am actually thinking about coming back and just having her coach me on the side. I want to get into the graduate program, get my Masters in Marriage Family Therapy, and keep training with coach,’ said Alejandra.

Angel Valdez is a former cross country teammate of Alejandra’s that graduated last year and is someone that she looks up to.

“She really took me in under her wing and she really brought out the best in me. I give her credit for who I am today and I give myself some credit, but I can say she brought out a hard working person,” said Alejandra.

Alejandra has a pre-meet ritual where she likes to drink a gallon of water the day before or the morning of the meet.

“I like to be really relaxed and I don’t like to stress about it. Before a race we pray and we just thank God for the opportunity,’ said Alejandra.

Alyssa Diaz is a teammate of both Bianca and Alejandra and has known them since high school. Over the years, they all have become really close friends and they always pray together before their meets.

“Bianca is very trustworthy and she is just someone who I can rely on at all times. She’s very outspoken and she’s a really good listener. She just has a good ear and gives really good advice,” said Diaz. “Aj is a little different, she has the same qualities that Bianca has, but Aj is extremely outspoken and extremely driven.”

One memory that Diaz has of them all is remembering when they went to a conference and watched Bianca run. She remembers how surreal it felt for all of them just to see each other succeed.

“Aj is more serious and Bianca is goofier in a sense, but also Aj is more hardcore and Bianca is really sensitive so they have two different personalities,” said Diaz.

The director of Track and Field, Marcia Mansur-Wentworth, said that the twins both have grown so much as athletes since they’ve been at CSUB.

“They both come from a pretty humble background. English is not their first language and they just have taken every opportunity to be successful. They are incredible leaders, role models and fantastic teammates. They are always there to lift up not only each other, but everyone on their team,” said Mansur-Wentworth.

Bianca struggled with some injuries last spring, but this season she is all ready to go.

“Right now she’s setting it on fire. She’s setting personal bests in her events and they just work really well together. They know how to hold each other accountable, but they take that energy to the entire team,” said Mansur-Wentworth.

They have shown that they can handle both being a student and a student-athlete.

“They want to let other people know that they can come to CSUB, be successful, and do anything that they want. They talk about their opportunities and blessings in their life, you know they’re just positive people,” said Mansur-Wentworth.