When Kirby Davis came to the University of Maine as a freshman, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to keep running or just focus on academics. The decision to keep running paid off in the fall of 2005 when he won the America East Cross Country Championship. In doing so, he became the first University of Maine runner to win the individual title.

But while he was having success on the cross country course, he was also excelling in the classroom, earning a 3.93 grade point average for the fall semester as a civil engineering major. He has earned Dean’s List honors in four of his five semesters and his cumulative grade point average of 3.54 also earned him a spot on the America East Cross Country All-Academic Team.

The academic honors have piled up for Davis, as he has been named to the America East Commissioners Honor Roll multiple times. He is also a two-time Maine Scholar-Athlete. As a sophomore, he was named a member of the Senior Skulls at the University of Maine. The Senior Skulls is an organization made up of the top one percent of the male students at Maine based on leadership, academics, and campus involvement.

While he has become a standout performer in cross country and track, the real reason he decided on Maine was the academics.

"I decided on Maine because of the engineering program," said Davis. "It has one of the top engineering programs in the country and that was a pretty good draw. Truthfully running had nothing to do with it because I did not think I was going to make it out of that first training camp. I hated running at the time. Senior year in high school I was slowing down and running really crappy, so I decided to focus on the school part. I would run at Maine, and if it worked out I would keep running, and if not I would just focus on school. I think what it was after training camp my freshman year we had an away meet at Central Connecticut State and I was second on the team. Granted our whole team was injured, but that made me think that it could work out."

It has worked out for Davis, both in cross country and indoor and outdoor track. In 2004, he was eighth in the America East Cross Country Championship in which Maine took the team title for the first time. At the 2005 America East Indoor Championships, Davis was fourth in the 5000 meters in 14:47.85, and was also fourth at the 2005 America East Outdoor Championships in the 5000 meters. He finished 11th in the 5000 meters at the 2004 America East Indoor Championships and was seventh in the 5000 meters at the America East Outdoor Championships that season.

"The two, running and academics, go hand in hand," said Maine cross country coach Mark Lech. "That is why I never worry about those kids academically. Distance running and track in general are a fitness driven sport. If you are not fit, 99 percent of the time you are not going to do well. If you want to do well, you have to understand you need to be fit. If you are going to be fit, you have to do the work, and to do the work you have to be self-motivated enough to do it."

That self-motivation is something that Davis applies to both running and academics. "For example over break, some of the workouts that Mark gave us are tough to do with the team, and they are even worse doing them completely alone and in the cold. So it is hard to find motivation that way, so you have to be driven internally. Same with school. There are tons of times when it would be way easier to turn the television on or just go to bed, but you have to dig deep and go to the library for an extra seven hours.

"To be a good distance runner you have to be internally motivated," according to Davis. "In turn you find a lot of distance runners who are smarter than the average group of students because they have that drive. We are pretty nerdy."

At the end of the 2005 America East Cross Country Championships, Kirby Davis had finished the 8,000 meter course in 25:38, nearly 21 seconds faster than the second place runner.

"I was not surprised when he won the America East title," said Coach Lech. "He was eighth overall the year before, and only one person was coming back this year that finished ahead of him. He is good in a way that he does not worry a lot about things. He is sort of a happy go lucky guy and at some point in time he knew he had a chance to win the thing, but he deals with the pressure well. He has the personality that is good at that. Kirby is able to execute under the pressure. If he has a bad race, he can come back from it. It is fun for him and it is a chance for him to do something well that he enjoys."

And that attitude while running is a direct result of the focus that Davis puts on his work in the classroom. "Part of that is because of the school work," said Davis. "Because I do not make running my entire life here, if there is a bad meet, whatever, it was a bad meet and I am still coming back tomorrow. However I beat myself up over school work. Like missing the 4.0 grade point average for the fall semester, I can pinpoint the exact test and the exact three questions that I would have had to get right, and should have gotten right, that kept me from getting it."

With the cross country season over, Davis is now focusing on the indoor and outdoor track seasons in which he runs the 5000 meters. "I would like to break the school record in the 5k," said Davis. "I think that is do-able and I think with the way that Mark is training us will help us get to those faster times. I want to get on a few record sheets before I leave."

And once he leaves Maine, he might switch from running to cycling or skiing. But he will continue to focus on academics. "I might go to graduate school, either masters or doctoral, for structural engineering. I also want to go out west or to Alaska to do some work out there, or maybe do grad school out there. Who knows?"