Eric Thies is learning to run hard every day.

The Arlington native and sophomore-to-be at the University of Nebraska runs track and cross country for the Cornhuskers. On Friday, he won the St. Peter Freedom Run 8-kilometer race.

“In high school, they often say the state meet is your hardest meet,” said Thies, 19, who qualified for state five years in a row for Sibley East High School. “But in college, every meet is a hard meet.”

Thies’ improvement is evident even in a holiday fun run.

In his fifth time running the approximately 5-mile route, Thies won for the first time. His time of 27 minutes, 23 seconds was nearly a minute faster than his third-place time from a year ago.

“I’m adjusting to college running,” he said. “It was a change, but I had a lot of good experiences.”

Thies finished 14 seconds ahead of one of a well-known high school and college rival, Zane Grabau.

Grabau, 20, is a Waterville native and Cannon Valley Lutheran High School graduate who now attends and runs for Concordia University in Seward, Neb.

“We ran against each other in high school, and we run against each other once in awhile in college,” said Grabau, who was running in his first Freedom Run. “I always make a point of talking to (Thies) before or after every race.”

Said Thies: “It was a good day to run. It’s a nice course, and there was good competition. ... It helped having Zane up there.”

North Mankato resident Todd Landgraff, 31, took third place with a time of 28:18. Andy Fillmore, 19, of Montgomery, was fourth in 28:41.

In all, 185 runners — 114 male and 71 female — got up early to compete in the 7:30 a.m. race. The ninth-annual event also featured a 5K walk and, for the first time, a 1-mile kids race, in which approximately 26 children participated.

The top boys and girls finishers were 10-year-old Aaron Leeb of St. Peter and 9-year-old Gretchen Blain of Mankato, respectively.

But it was the college runners who dominated the big race.

On the women’s side, New Ulm native Greta Sieve, a distance runner for the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, won and was 26th overall with a time of 34:25.