04/23/26 Nerdsletter
- jayslagle
- 8 minutes ago
- 8 min read
Contributor: The Nerd
The Nerd is on vacation
My apologies for a weak Nerdsletter this week but I'm wrapping up a five-day tour of Utah national parks. If you haven't visited national parks, here are a few tips:
Stay in shape as you get older. I saw far too many adults who couldn't fully enjoy the parks because they weren't fit enough.
Go in the offseason. If you avoid out-of-school times, national parks aren't overrun. During our times at Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef and Bryce, we never waited for a spot in the parking lots that are usually filled to the gills in the summer.
Start your day early. We're typically at our first destination in a park by sunrise, guaranteeing a parking spot at the trailhead and a nearly-empty trail.
Titan Classic 1600
Coach Haselhorst of Papio South orchestrated an excellent event last Thursday during the Titan Classic. The girls' and boys' 1600 were moved to near the end of the meet and run under the lights. In the marquee girls' race, the eight girls were introduced one at a time, with each girls' career highlights listed. Aside from the State T&F meet, I don't think I've seen a more electric environment. Five of the eight owned their school records in the 1600 and, by the end of the race, five of the eight had established new PBs. Chris Basnett of Harvest Sports wrote an excellent recap of the race at this link, so I'll spare you my version of the events.
During the race, as I watched other athletes lining the infield and spectators standing in lanes five and six on the homestretch and backstretch, I had the odd feeling that I didn't really need to be there. In addition to Chris, the race was covered by Stu from the World Herald, Hurrdat, at least one television sportscaster, four Nerds and a whole host of other photographers. If only for five or so minutes, the sport was given a level of media attention that we've always wanted it to have. And, curiously, while I reveled in the ferocious performances by Arens, Hegge, Steffensen, McClain and Freyer, I wondered if on that night I should have been the sole photographer at a meet in Wisner or Tecumseh or Battle Creek.
In the end, it doesn't really matter where the Nerds go. Our cameras capture rock stars at every meet, even the junior high ones, and our goal has always been to shine a light on athletes whether they finish first or last. On Thursday night, it was a thrill to watch eight girls take center stage. Let's do it again next year.
Middle school Monday
Each Monday (assuming I don't forget) we ask our followers to shout out junior high kids who had great performances in the prior week. Here are a few who were mentioned:
Adler Chubb, a 7th-grader at Chase County, improved his discus PB by almost 14 feet, throwing 100-05 at Perkins County.
Kellen Nielsen of Elmwood-Murdock ran 2:19 (800) and 5:05 (1600) at Syracuse to win both events in new PBs.
The Scottsbluff boys 4x400 squad ran a 3:57.06 at Sidney on Monday.
Hunter Pieper-Bradley of Scottsbluff posted the season's 2nd-fastest 100 hurdles time with his 14.44 at Sidney on Monday.
Nick Scott of Beatrice ran a 4:55.97 1600 at Marysville on Thursday, and then ran a 4:55.80 on Monday. He's one of two Beatrice 8th-graders with sub-5:00 marks.
Wesley Carr, an 8th-grader at Sandhills-Thedford, triple jumped 35-11 in Hershey. She's leading the State this season by almost three feet.
Ashlyn Pursley, an 8th-grader at Chase County, pole vaulted 9-00 at Perkins County.
Madison Vetter of Kearney Zion Lutheran ran a 2:27 800 at Mount Michael on Saturday.
Ella Clement of Kearney Sunrise posted the season's best 100-meter dash with her time of 12.24, a full 0.26 seconds ahead of the second best mark. She also posted a season-leading 200-meter time of 25.85 at the same meet on April 16.
Vylah Karre of Elkhorn Ridge posted the season's fastest 1600 with her 5:36.07 at Gretna last Tuesday.
Shay Pospisil of Bishop Neumann has the season's fastest 100 hurdles after her 15.51 on Friday at Elkhorn. Judging by the hurdles records listed below, Bishop Neumann's hurdles coach needs a raise.
The West Holt girls' 4x100 and 4x400 teams of Myers, Flannery, Dvorak and Konrad posted season-best times of 52.11 and 4:22.32 at the O'Neill meet on April 21.
If you haven't noticed, we post quite a few Facebook albums from junior high meets. If we can get kids to love track and field during junior high, that leads to great things in high school.
Rankings
We continue to update our rankings spreadsheet at https://www.preprunningnerd.com/rankings with the latest meet results. We refresh this spreadsheet every few days so a performance will not be added as soon as it is posted to athletic.net. If you're aware of omissions or errors, please let us know.
Results and photos
Our results page needs a programming fix before I can link any more results, and that's a fix I can't make from a hotel room in Denver. I also don't have easy access to the Nerd albums posted in the last week, so the photo page pon our website will be outdated until I can tackle it this weekend. So... basically... the lesson here is that I shouldn't take vacation in the middle of the season.
New State records (*pending)
We saw ten performances in the past week that would be ratified as State records if they don't get broken before the ratification occurs (hint hint), and they represent the 8th through 17th records of the year:
#17 Beau Fujan, Bishop Neumann - 13.86 110HH (0.6 m/s) at the Bennington meet on Tuesday, 4/21, breaking Class C record of 14.01 by Jaxon Knisley (NPSP) from 2024.
#16 Beau Fujan - 21.60 200 (1.5 m/s) at the Bennington meet on Tuesday, 4/21, breaking Class C record of 21.78 by Cole Biodrowski of Fort Calhoun in 2001.
#15 Aubrey Fujan, Bishop Neumann - 14.28 100H (1.3 m/s) at the Bennington meet on Tuesday, 4/21, breaking her own Class C record of 14.45 from 2025.
#14 Mia Cushing, Elkhorn - 11.92 100 (1.3 m/s) at the Bennington meet on Tuesday, 4/21, breaking the Class B record of 11.94 set by Katy Jay of Mitchell in 1999.
#13 Addie West, Omaha Skutt - 55.81 400 at the Bennington meet on Tuesday, 4/21, breaking the Class B record of 55.95 set by Sydney Stodden of Elkhorn North in 2024.
#12 Avery Arens, a freshman at Crofton, is breaking State records before the previous ones can get posted on the NSAA website. On April 8 she ran a hand-timed 10:51.7 3200 at the Knox County meet, which if ratified would have broken the previous Class C record of 10:59.05 set by Tamala Resh of Shelton on 1983. However, on Tuesday, April 21 at the USD Battle of the Border, Arens posted an electronic time of 10:31.69 to set the new standard. She also holds the Class C 1600 record after her 4:56.18 on April 16 at the Titan Classic. In case you're wondering, she's run the 800 twice this season and her best time is four seconds off the Class C record of 2:14.35 set by Jordan Metzler of Wakefield in 2023. If you're really curious, the All-Class 3200 record is held by Karlene Erickson (Wheeler Central), who ran 10:19 in 1982. The Class A record is held by two-time Olympian and US marathon record holder Emily Sisson, who posted a 10:23.00 for Millard North in 2008.
#11 Avery Arens, a freshman at Crofton, broke her own yet-to-be-ratified 1600-meter Class C record of 5:00.00 from April 8 (see #6 below) with a 4:56.18 at the Titan Classic on Thursday, April 18. She was one of three girls in that race to dip below the 5:00 mark.
#10 Jaiya Patillo, a junior at Bellevue West, broke her own Class A and All-Class 400-meter record of 54.66 set in 2024 with a 54.41 at the Elkhorn meet on Thursday, April 16.
#9 Noah Rau, a senior at Chase County and a UNL T&F commit, threw the discus 207-03 on Thursday, April 16 at Sutherland to break his own Class C and All-Class record of 205-07 set on April 2nd.
#8 Alyssa Onnen, a senior at Kearney Catholic and a UNL T&F commit, pole vaulted 13-04.25 at the Gothenburg meet on Thursday, April 16 to break her Class C record of 13-00.25 from the 2025 State meet and the All-Class record of 13-04.00 set by Jaidyn Garrett of Columbus in 2019.
Throughout the season we'll keep track of performances that have been or will be forwarded to the NSAA for record certification:
#7Â - Avery Arens of Crofton ran a 10:51.65 3200 at the Knox County meet on Wednesday, April 8. If the handheld time is accepted by the NSAA, it will break the Class C record of 10:51.65 set by Tamala Resh of Shelton in 1983.
#6Â - Avery Arens of Crofton ran a 5:00.00 1600 at the Knox County meet on Wednesday, April 8. If the handheld time is accepted by the NSAA, it will break the Class C record of 5:05.25 set by Rylee Rice of Ainsworth in 2017.
#5Â - Brock Bailey of Dundy County Stratton threw the shot 63-10.00 at the Perkins County meet on Friday, April 2nd. This mark breaks his previous but not-yet-certified-by-the-NSAA Class D record throw of 63-04.25 (see #2Â below) at the Southern Valley meet on March 27.
#4Â - Abigael Spargo of Dundy County Stratton set the Class D 300 hurdles record with her 44.12 mark at the Perkins County meet on Friday, April 2nd. She broke the record of 44.76 set by Skylar Hadley of Loomis in 2018.
#3Â - Noah Rau of Chase County set the All-Class and Class C discus record with his 205-07 mark at the Ogallala meet on Friday, April 2nd. He broke his previous All-Class record of 203-09 that was set at last year's State meet as well as the previous Class C record of 196-11 set by Derric Werner of Elkhorn Valley in 2002. Because Chase County moved from Class B in 2025 to Class C in 2026, Noah will soon have the unusual distinction of holding both the Class B (203-09 in 2025) and Class C (205-07 in 2026) State records. Fun fact A: The steel measuring tape used to measure Noah's throw was borrowed from the Cozad coach, who now carries it in case Chayden Hoffmaster (see #1Â below) decides to break another record. Fun fact B: Ogallala also moved from Class B to Class C this year, which means Ogallala's Shaydyn Rasby, the current Class B record holder in the 300 hurdles at 43.45, has an opportunity to crack the Class C record of 43.29.
#2Â - Brock Bailey of Dundy County Stratton threw the shot 63-04.25 at the Southern Valley invite on March 27, topping the Class D mark of 63-01.25 set by Steve Kriewald of North Loup-Scotia at the State meet in 2000.
#1Â - Chayden Hoffmaster of Cozad posted a long jump of 24-05.50 leap at the UNK indoor meet on March 20. There was initial confusion about whether an indoor mark qualified for a State record, but Cozad does plan to submit the mark. The previous mark of 23-08.25 was set by Tyler Wullenwaber of Centennial in 2009. Chayden topped the previous record a second time, jumping 23-10.00 at Holdrege meet on March 27, but the wind reading for that jump was 2.4 m/s, just over the limit of 2.0 m/s.
As of Tuesday, 4/21, none of the above are reflected as State records on the NSAA website at https://secure.nsaahome.org/nsaaforms/tr/staterecords.php. Check out our April 7 Nerdsletter if you'd like more information on how wind strength impacts State record certification.
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First published at www.preprunningnerd.com by Jay Slagle on April 22, 2026. 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 T&F and 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 ," a story about a high school triple jumper who became a quadrapalegic after a swimming accident.