Contributor: The Nerd
The season is over. You won.
I'm no math genius but I'm guessing that, on average, the athletes who competed at State didn't do as well as they had hoped. And that 'below expectations' feeling probably extends to many of the athletes who competed this season. You didn't medal at State, you didn't qualify for State, you didn't make varsity, or you didn't PR this season.
We see you, in part because the Nerdlings in our house have finished seasons feeling the same way as you. In fact, I wrote the article "The Season is Over, You Won" four years ago, just a few days before Nerd the Third ran his final State XC meet. Despite qualifying for the State every year, he hadn't run well at State his first three years due to what was probably puberty-induced fatigue. As he fought through fatigue in the two weeks leading up to that final State meet in 2020, I wanted to be sure that he recognized that his success in running wasn't measured in State medals.
Four years later, that's the message I want to share with each of you. Click here to read the article, The season is over. You won.
A bigger purpose
If you needed a reminder that race results are the smallest part of cross country...
Anica Gannon, a senior at Wahoo, chose to compete at State on Friday despite unexpectedly losing her mother, Amy Gannon-Warren, earlier in the week. She was one of only four girls on the Wahoo squad; six competitors per team are allowed in Class C and the first four count towards team scores. Wahoo finished 8th out of 15.
When given the option to not race, she declined. “I’m going to run for my mom, I’m not going to disappoint her.”
She ran a 22:57, a PR.
Please send up prayers to Anica and her family.
State results
The State meet results are posted to athletic.net at https://www.athletic.net/CrossCountry/meet/242041/results/all and here are links to the results on the NSAA website:
State meet records
Deep fields and Friday's mild temps resulted in outstanding times. While Carson Noecker's course record of 14:51 (2022 UNK meet) still stands, Juan Gonzalez of Fremont captured the All-Class State meet record with his time of 14:52.1, better than Noecker's 14:58 in 2022. Juan also broke the Class A 15:04 State meet mark set by Seth Hirsch in 2016. Braden Lofquest (below) of Gretna East ran the 4th-fastest All-Class time with his 15:14.6.
Four of the top five Class B State meet times were registered on Friday by Lofquest (1st), Austin Carrera of Hastings (2nd), Tommy Rice of Skutt (4th) and Joe Majerus of Pius (5th) while Greg Kahnk of Elkhorn now sits at 3rd with his 15:25 in 1987.
Kendall Zavala of Norris established a new Class B State meet record with her win in 18:23.9, besting the mark of 18:32.5 set by Mazie Larsen of Gretna in 2016. Mazie still has the 2nd and 4th fastest Class B times at State.
There were no additions to the Class C boys top 5 with Carson Noecker still holding the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th fastest times on the C leaderboard. Hailey O'Daniel of Arlington and Avery Heinrich of Columbus Scotus are now 4th and 5th in Class C State meet history with their 19:26 and 19:27 finishes. Keeli Green still holds the top two Class C marks at 18:50 and 19:15, so Arlington now has three of the four fastest times in Class C history - all run in the last four years.
Mason McGreer and Eli Goodell of Perkins County both broke the previous Class D meet record of 16:02 set by Ben Arens of Ainsworth in 2018. Mason ran 15:52 with Eli four seconds behind. Kaser Johnson of Doniphan-Trumbull now sits at #5 all-time with his 16:25.
Finally, here's a fun fact - Class B #2/#4 Mazie Larsen and Class D #3 Ben Arens are both in medical school at UNMC.
We didn't see that one coming
We're not going to do a deep dive into the State results because State was SO five days ago. Based on how many people read last year's similarly-delayed race recap, most of you would happily trade my commentary for faster uploads of pictures.
The one race we do want to comment on is Class D boys. We said at the beginning of the season that Perkins County could win the State title if their third runner could do just enough to outpace North Platte St. Patrick's and Doniphan-Trumbull. As it turned out, Perkins County's fourth runner was the most important team member of the day. Based on scores of the first three runners, Perkins County and North Platte St. Pat's tied with 28 points. The tiebreaker went to the team with the highest-placing fourth runner. That runner was Ethan Swesey, who with his 62nd-place finish helped clinch Perkins County's first State XC title since 2007. If you wondered if cross country was a team sport, Ethan has an answer for you.
3- and 4-time State medalists
Each year we update the list of 3- and 4-time Class A State XC medalists. Our list initially went back to 1993, and North Platte coach Jacob Hasenauer added to the list by going through all of the results on the NSAA website. Consequently, the boys' list now dates back to 1960 and the girls' list begins in 1980.
After my oldest son earned his third medal, I started the list because I wanted to know how rare (or common) it was for someone to earn three or four medals. I discovered that it is pretty rare. There have been 65 boys State meets that have resulted in ten 4-time medalists and fifty-eight 3-time medalists. There were no new entries on the boys' list this year, but Juan Gonzalez did move from a 3-time medalist to a 4-time medalist.
The feat is a bit more common among girls, although still incredibly impressive given the thousands of girls who have competed at State since 1980. In 45 State meets, twenty-six girls are 4-time medalists and fifty girls are 3-time medalists. Abbigail Durow (above) of Millard South and Alexis Chadek of Papillion La Vista each earned their third medals this year, and they'll get a chance for a fourth next fall.
As I noted last year, boys and girls seem to face different challenges to reach this accomplishment. For boys, the biggest hurdle is to medal as a freshman or sophomore. J'Shawn Afuh of Lincoln North Star (sophomore) and Aiden Gehring of Papio South (freshman) were the only two boys to do so this year. In most years freshmen and sophomore medalists are more common for girls, who then have to fight off the younger girls as they get older. However, this year only three younger girls medaled in Class A - freshman Mabel Henningsen of Marian and sophomores Grace Volzke of Elkhorn South and Sadie Osher of Millard West.
Interesting data, right? Would you love to see the lists for B, C and D? For example, the Norris program believes that Kendall Zavala and Atlee Wallman may be the first-ever Class B girls to win four State individual and 4 State team medals. Having a 4X list for Class B would be a great starting point to confirm that info.
If you reach out to me, I'll show you how to compile it.
Photos
Oh boy, do we have photos. We've have posted photos on our Facbook page that are sorted by the eight races plus a bonus album of signs and sights. The easiest way to navigate through thousands of pictures is to go to our album page at https://www.facebook.com/PrepRunningNerd/photos_albums.
We had two categories of photographers at Kearney. The first were 'volume' shooters whose goal was to capture images of as many runners as possible so athletes would have a quality photo from their State experience. The second category was 'art' shooters, and their goal was to capture the State environment by photographing spectators, teams and signs. Here's a sampling of what you can find on our Facebook page:
Blazing Tiger
The College of St. Mary and Doane co-hosted the Blazing Tiger meet last Saturday at Mahoney State Park. A whopping 35 NAIA teams competed, likely making this the largest and most competitive NAIA meet this season except for Nationals. Nerd Dawg has already posted his photo albums for that meet on our Facebook page, and we should have some additional photos from High Mileage Nerd by this weekend.
Extra qualifiers?
In October 2023 we first wrote about whether the NSAA should expand the State qualification rules so that a minimum number of non-team qualifiers were advanced out of each District. Our concern was that several loaded teams might be assigned to the same District, thereby reducing the chances for individual qualifiers. For example, in the top 15 of this year's A1 girls District, team qualifiers Millard West, Papio South and Elkhorn South had 7, 3 and 3 qualifiers, respectively. That left just two spots for girls on non-qualifying teams.
The small number of qualifiers are particularly pronounced in Classes A and B. In the B3 boys race, Lincoln Pius and Lexington took 11 of the 15 spots while Norris and Lincoln Pius took 10 of the 15 spots in the B3 girls race. The summary of non-team qualifiers is listed below:
District | A boys | A girls | B boys | B girls | C boys | C girls | D boys | D girls |
1 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 9 |
2 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 5 |
3 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 7 | 8 |
4 | 6 | 6 | 4 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 7 | 6 |
5 | - | - | - | - | 5 | 6 | 5 | 9 |
6 | - | - | - | - | - | - | 6 | 6 |
Subtotal | 16 | 15 | 17 | 19 | 26 | 33 | 38 | 43 |
Team qualifiers | 84 | 84 | 72 | 72 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 |
Max field | 100 | 99 | 89 | 91 | 116 | 123 | 128 | 133 |
2024 field | 100 | 99 | 89 | 89 | 115 | 120 | 124 | 121 |
Proposal impact | +24 | +25 | +23 | +21 | +24 | +17 | +22 | +17 |
In part because Class D District teams are limited to five athletes, the number of non-team qualifiers in each District is higher than Class A and B. Class C non-team qualifiers tend to be around five or six in each District, although the C3 girls race had nine non-team qualifiers.
As we noted in our September 25 Nerdsletter, the Wisner-Pilger athletic director and cross country coach have submitted a proposal to increase the number of non-team qualifiers to 10. Based on 2024 District results, we've listed the impact of that proposal in the last row of the table above.
Drop your shield
The milder temps on Friday drastically reduced the number of DNFs at State, but there were still plenty of disappointed kids. Three of the eight top-ranked runners didn't win, teams that were favorites heading into the meet didn't make the podium, and many medalist hopefuls fell short of their goals.
Last year there was so much carnage among the top runners that I struggled to make sense of how such a beautiful sport could also be so cruel. The day after the State meet, a church service and an in-home concert provided me with the insight I needed.
High school can be a tough place for teenagers. If you're not a stud football player, cheerleader or the kid with a million TikTok followers, the safest thing to do is to maintain a low profile. Don't stick out. Don't be the soloist or the lead actor or the nerdy kid who volunteers answers during math class. Be careful how you express your feelings. Don't let people see you fail.
And then there's cross country. Every kid sings the solo. They are all lead actors. They fail more often than they succeed.
That's why we wrote, "Drop Your Shield." It's a letter of appreciation to every kid who ran cross country this year, especially the athletes at the back of the pack. It's a must-read article for parents and athletes.
Is she a cyclist or a runner?
Due to an early-September hip injury, during the last seven weeks of the season Cece Kramper of Duchesne ran a total of 42 miles, for an average of six miles per week. That 42 miles consisted of four 5k races, 7 miles of 'fast' running and 23 miles of 'slow' running. She supplemented her running with high-intensity biking and 45 minutes of daily strength training prescribed by her physical therapist.
On Friday she finished 6th in an absolutely loaded Class B field where four sub-20:00 girls didn't medal. That's a nice result for a cyclist.
All good things must come to an end
Three streaks ended on Friday. The Lincoln East girls ended their streak of six consecutive Class A titles, finishing 8th at State. The Norris girls finished second in Class B after winning the past three years. Omaha Skutt and Lexington have been the top two Class B boys teams for the past seven years, but they finished 3rd and 6th on Friday. All four programs have great coaches and young talent, so don't be surprised if they start a new streak soon.
Seriously, all good things must come to an end
We have one last article to write about the upcoming roster changes at the Division 1 level, but this will be our last Nerdsletter of the season. We appreciate the news tips we received from coaches and followers throughout the season, and hopefully we've done at least a little this fall to raise the profile of Nebraska distance running.
Nerd alert
The Nerds are a bunch of volunteers (ages 18-70) spread out all over the State who go to XC and T&F meets, shoot pictures and then share them for free on our Facebook page. About half of our Nerds are parents with athletes still competing in high school, but another dozen just do this because they love these two sports.
Have you considered being a Nerd? We'd love to expand our presence, especially in Grand Island, Kearney, Valentine and any far-flung parts of Nebraska. Here are the general requirements: (a) a quality camera and a sports lens (generally 70-200mm, approx 8" long), (b) the ability to edit photos, (c) familiarity with Facebook and (d) the willingness to accept gentle feedback on how you could improve your photography. If you're interested, please e-mail me at jayslagle@hotmail.com. We're going to chill out for a few months so our first e-mail back to you may simply be, "Great, I'll reach out in January."
Most Nerds shoot one meet per week. In addition to the time attending the meet, you'll probably spend 3-6 hours at home editing those photos. It's absolutely a volunteer role; all you'll receive in return is a lousy Nerd shirt. However, if you love T&F and XC, this is a great way to give back to the sport.
Now you see them, now you...
One of the cool things about today's photo editing software is that you can use AI to erase things in a picture that you don't like. It's kind of fun to make people disappear.
The free team bus
Cross country coaches are a creative bunch, doing the best they can to utilize their local environments to maximize training runs. While some programs use nearby hills or country roads to their advantage, the Omaha Central girls program takes full advantage of... the city bus.
Omaha Central is located at 20th & Dodge and it's surrounded by concrete, stoplights and quite a bit of traffic. For many years the team relied on OPS buses to get their team to and from Memorial Park and Elmwood Park so they had better training options, but the buses were often delayed. In 2021 senior Elana Elder suggested to coach Trent Lodge that the team use ORBT instead. The ORBT bus runs continuously east and west on Dodge Street throughout the day, with bus stops near Omaha Central and Memorial Park. ORBT is free for high school students.
Elana's suggestion was on point, and now the team travels on ORBT nearly every day to use the two parks adjacent to Dodge Street. A coach meets the team at the 20th & Dodge bus stop, collects backpacks and water bottles, and then performs a head count before the girls jump on the bus. Practice starts about 20 minutes later when the coaches arrive at the park.
Odds and ends
We have heard of schools canceling classes for a big ballgame but Friday was the first time we have heard of a school district cancelling classes for the State XC meet. The Perkins County district cancelled classes from pre-K through high school on Friday so that anyone interested could attend the State meet to cheer on their boys team. The district also arranged for a bus to take about 50 fans to Kearney. The boys did not disappoint, winning Perkins County's first State XC title since 2007.
Nerd Junior had ambitious running plans for this fall but has taken it easy while he slowly builds back from a stress reaction incurred this summer. On Sunday he was plugging along at a 7:00 pace around mile 11 of the Good Life Halfsy when a young lady cruised by him. He knew he'd seen her before but couldn't place her. He connected the dots an hour later when he looked at the final results. Class D champion Kayleigh Betka of McCool Junction had left him in her dust.
We ran into Emily Hegge, the two-time Junior High State XC runner-up, along the starting area at the State meet. Her sign supported athletes from Marian, Millard West, Papio South, Brownell Talbot, Gothenburg and Sandy Creek. She told me that the kids listed on her sign (above) were either her Club 402 teammates or girls she's competed against at the Junior High State meets at Papio South and Gothenburg. Emily will attend Papio South next fall.
There are over a hundred media types at the State meet, including a number who only attend one cross country meet each year. At the 4600-meter mark during the Class D boys race, a photographer began yelling at coaches and spectators that they were in a media zone and were ruining his pictures. Aside from the first 100 meters and a few roped off areas throughout the course, there isn't a media zone at State. The same holds true for almost every high school meet. There are times when the Nerds will ask if a spectator wouldn't mind stepping back so we can get a clear view of the runners, but it's becoming increasingly common at regular season meets for athletes and parents to purposely move out of our camera shot because they know it will improve the photos we post for free. So... we apologize for the rogue photographer who yelled on Friday, and we are thankful for all of you who help us capture great images.
At the 2500-meter mark during the Class B girls race, a girl passing near me yelled out, "I can't!" Almost immediately the competitor next to her - definitely not from the same team - responded with an encouraging "You can!" Reason #16,481 why we love cross country.
For the track Nerds in the crowd, especially field event and sprint athletes - College of St. Mary will start their community sessions on Saturday, November 2. For an admission fee of $5, athletes can utilize CSM's 200-meter indoor track. No outside timing equipment or timing gates can be brought in. The sessions are on Saturdays from 10:30 to noon and Tuesday nights from 6:30-8:00. Priority is given to lap runners the first 45 minutes and to straightaway runners the last 45 minutes. The sessions are expected to last until February.
More art photos
As a final treat, here are a few more photos that are just too good to hide inside a Facebook album.
******
First published at www.preprunningnerd.com by Jay Slagle on October 30, 2024. If you find an error, shoot us an e-mail at jayslagle@hotmail.com and we'll get it fixed.
Like this coverage of the Nebraska cross country scene? There's more of this at www.preprunningnerd.com. Check out the Blog tab for our frequent stories and the Results tab for every Nebraska high school meet we can find. If you want to see meet photos or just need to kill a few hours on social media, follow us on Twitter and Instagram @PrepRunningNerd or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/preprunningnerd.
Finally, if you think runners, jumpers and throwers are the best things on earth, you'll enjoy our two most popular articles. In 2018 we published "The Runner with the Broken Heart" about a high school boy who finished last in nearly every race he ran. In 2022 we published, "The Fall and Rise of Emmett Hassenstab," a story about a high school triple jumper who became a quadrapalegic after a swimming accident.