Formosa Sisters Power Edison Program : Cross-country: The team within the Charger team is quite talented.

Teamwork is stressed at Edison High, but that’s not a virtue the Formosa twins had to learn when they arrived there in 1991.

Jeannie and Jennifer have been an integral part of the Chargers’ success, which includes two State cross-country championships and three Southern Section titles.

A lifetime of sharing made it easy for the identical twins to fit into a team-oriented system such as the Chargers.

“We like the same things, the same clothes, the same music,” said Jeannie.

“If I have $20 from baby-sitting or something,” Jeannie said, “I don’t consider it my $20. It’s ours.”

As similar as the two can be, the twins can be told apart by those close to them.

Jeannie is more outgoing, or as Charger cross-country Coach Kristi McGihon puts it, “Jen definitely has more tact than Jeannie.”

Jennifer’s tact helps her to sit back and take in a situation, whereas Jeannie will speak her mind on a moment’s notice.

“I’m the more dominant one,” Jeannie said. “I’m better with expressing my opinion.”

Said Jennifer: “Look, see, she just butted right in before me and answered.”

What Jennifer lacks in the assertiveness department, she makes up for on the cross-country course, letting her talent do the talking.

When the Chargers won the Orange County Championships last fall, Jennifer was the first Edison runner across the finish line, finishing 15th. Jeannie was the third Charger to finish, 25th overall.

Both have earned All-Sunset League honors the past three years in helping the Chargers to three consecutive league titles.

“I work harder than Jeannie,” said Jennifer, who has thus far this fall shared Edison’s top-runner duties with senior Keri Wright. “She (Jeannie) started out better than me, but I caught her.”

Said Jeannie: “I work hard, too. It’s like Jennifer likes to feel pain or something.”

It was Jennifer who started the twins running by wanting to join the track team in elementary school. Jeannie soon followed.

“You know how it is when you’re a twin and you’re a little kid,” Jennifer said. “You have to do everything together.”

That includes wearing similar clothes and even going so far as to substitute for one another in class from time to time.

“We do it when one of us is having a bad day,” Jennifer said.

Said Jeannie: “We did it two or three times last year, but that was the first time.”

As for the clothes, she added: “We used to do it on the first day of school, but we’re seniors in high school now, so we’re over that.”

The one thing the twins haven’t gotten over is their desire to succeed in sports.

At 12, they were introduced to race walking, a sport similar to distance running. They were an instant success.

“We qualified for the Pan American Games in Bulgaria,” Jeannie said. “And we got to train with the best women in the United States at the Olympic training center.”

Their mother decided, however, that the travel involved with international race-walking competition would be too much for her daughters and instead steered them toward running.

“She decided not to let us go because we would be competing with women 20 years older than us and it as a long way from home,” Jennifer said. “We decided that we could always pick up race walking later on, like in college, because it’s not an event in high school.”

The twins hope to stay together through college, but haven’t decided which to attend.

Jeannie would like to prepare for a career in politics at North Carolina, but Jennifer said she has no interest in politics.

“But I do vote,” she said, laughing.