The Johnnies had a good meet last weekend at the University of Minnesota, but we will be glad to be back home for this Saturday’s meet. Going into last weekend, I knew Saturday was going to be a long, but I didn’t anticipate a meet lasting eleven hours. Thankfully we had an extra vehicle and could send the team home after the running events finished. After some technical difficulties with the measurement laser in throws, the men’s shot put was just starting as the running events finished. The team arrived home with plenty of time to “study” on Saturday evening, while the shot putters and I returned much later. 

Despite the delays, we still had some good performances. Kevin Arthur (JR, Champlin Park) finished second in the 200m dash to a Gopher while improving his personal best with a time of 22.58 sec.  First year sprinter Caden Wheeler (Andover) made his collegiate debut in the 60m dash with a strong 7.17 sec. performance. Caden is also a running back and kick returner for the SJU football team. He will be a very good two-sport athlete for the Johnnies. Representing the field events, sophomore Zach Schaffer (Chaska) improved his long jump to 21-5. Zach is in his first year of doing track and learning along the way.  The big highlight was Carter Grove’s (SO, Osakis) 3,000 meter victory. He dropped 16 seconds from his previous best time and ran a smart race with a decisive move at 5 laps left. Carter spent much of last year on the injured list and we are excited to have him back competing. 

Saturday we are back at SJU with a start time of 11:00am. The other teams competing are Minnesota-Morris, Concordia-Moorhead, Southwest Minnesota State, Gustavus, St. Cloud State, the Minnesota Running Club, the St. Cloud State Running Club, and Ryan Bromenschenkel (‘99). If you see Ryan at the meet, feel free to escort him to the pole vault area so he doesn’t miss his event again. 

Hope to see you there. 

Jeremy 

BTW: We have two options for apparel orders: 

The first option closes on February 15th:

https://sjutrack-field23.itemorder.com/shop/home/

The second option does not have a deadline:

https://shop.game-one.com/minnesota/collegeville/saint-johns-university/saint-johns-university-johnnies-track--field

SJU Track and Field started the indoor season last weekend with our annual Alumni meet.  While we were able to host the meet outdoors last year, this is the first indoor alumni meet since 2020. It’s great to have everyone here and the 4x400m relay teams didn’t disappoint. 

There was a good turnout of alumni competing and attending the reception. The alumni team was able to field an athlete in every event except long jump and hurdles. They did have a hurdler entered although Ryan Bromenschenkel (‘99) got sidetracked by a Tim Miles story and didn’t make it to the starting line. Maybe next time!

A few highlights from the alumni team:

• The thrower alumni had a great showing winning both shot put and weight throw. After a few wild weight throws, Kai Barber (‘19) was able to control his old-man strength and win shot put. Gavin Rupp (‘22) had a big throw in the second round of the weight and was able to hold on for the win. 

• Steve Dalhed (‘05) used his experience to edge a couple of freshmen at the line to win his heat in the 400m dash.

• The return of Jim Schoffman (‘75)! He has been a staple of our alumni meet and it is great to have him back competing in multiple events! 

• The Alumni put together a strong 4x400m relay team. The young distance team did their best to hold off the alumni by using a giant stuffed sloth as a baton. The large baton slung over their shoulders  forced the alumni into lane three to pass. Ultimately, the young distance guys succumbed to the weight of the sloth and the smarter baton choice of the alumni proved successful. 

As for the current team, our returners are a little rusty and our new athletes are, well, new. There are a lot of new faces this year and I am excited to see how they develop. We will have a better prognosis for the season after the next two meets. 

The team will be competing at the University of Minnesota on Saturday, February 4th and we will be back at Saint John’s Saturday, February 11th. I hope to see some of you there as we will be breaking out our new uniforms for the home meet. A special thanks to everyone who donated for the new uniforms. Will the Johnnies still rock the baby blue singlet and red shorts? Be there to find out!

Jeremy

Welcome to another track and field season! The team will officially toe the line, enter the circle, or get on the runway this weekend on Saturday, January 28th for our alumni meet. As usual, we will have freshmen having their first collegiate competition and 4x400m relay teams are already planning their outfits. This event will also showcase the newly resurfaced indoor track. The track has been a great upgrade to our facility and we are all excited to show it off this weekend. 

It was great to host the meet outdoors last year and we heard several of your requests to keep the meet outdoors. We deliberated about the status of our alumni meet after moving it outdoors last season. However, we felt extremely lucky with perfect weather for an early-April day last year. That same meet has been canceled or postponed several of the previous years. The meet also proved to be a huge undertaking to accommodate the larger outdoor meet, the decathlon/heptathlon, and the alumni. As a compromise, we will be adding an alumni gathering to one of our outdoor meets with access to the press box to gather and watch the meet if the weather dictates. As always, alumni are welcome to compete in any of our home meets. Simply contact me and I will enter you in the event of your choosing. 

This meet is always a highlight of the team. The current athletes are able to meet and put a face to some of the legendary names from the record books and Tim’s stories. If you haven’t done so, please consider attending and use the link below to register. It is truly great to see all of you there. 

2023 Alumni Meet Registration

Thanks for reading and all of your support for this team. 

Jeremy

During these first couple weeks of the semester, the athletes have been trickling in to check on Joe and I and there always seems to be a group of guys training at the track. They are excited about the new indoor track and want to train on it. I have had to kick a few outside as there is no reason to be training indoors when it is 70 degrees and sunny!

Thursday (today) is our big annual Go Johnnies Challenge fundraising event. I shared some of the information last week and want to show more details of how your generous donations will help the team this year. Most of the donations will go to three main areas: competition trips, equipment, and bonus coaches.

Competition trips include the cross country team traveling to Oregon in the fall and the track team going to California in the spring. We want our guys to know we value and support them, and will provide competitive opportunities to help them reach their athletic goals. Therefore we pay all of the expenses for the athletes- that ensures equity for all athletes and does not put undue burden on families.

Our equipment needs vary each year. The areas requiring regular replacements are pole vault poles and throwing equipment. (Seriously, if someone can come up with a weight implement that lasts longer than one season, you will get a high five from me.) Also, we have been adding weight training equipment to the indoor track for our entire team to utilize. The extra training equipment near the track means the guys can finish their workout without needing to go into a crowded weight room and saves time for our guys.

Finally, we use some of the money to help pay our part-time coaches. We are very fortunate to have some great help and I want to make sure they are compensated for their help. These coaches include: our vault coach, John Pollack who has been a tremendous asset, Maxwell Kuzara who has proven a great right-hand-man for Tim and the distance guys, and Drew Schoenbauer who has had a big impact on the sprint crew. We would not be as successful without those guys. This year we will have one coaching change as Drew has moved out to Colorado and we will replace him with another member of the 2019 National Championship 4x100 team: Brady Labine. We are excited to have John, Maxwell and Brady with us this year.

Here again are the three options to help out our 2022-23 Track and Field team (see below). You can simply make a donation or create a matching gift to encourage others with your donation. We have a few matching gifts already created; you can see on the donation page. Also, please help spread the word and share this information with your teammates, friends and family. We have been so fortunate for your support in the past, we hope you consider continuing that tradition. Remember, all of your donations go directly to the cross country /track and field team.

Here are three ways you can help the cross country/track and field teams for the Go Johnnies Challenge:

1. Donate: Support the Cross Country/Track & Field Teams through a donation. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the designation.

   • Donate to the Go Johnnies Challenge

2. Spread the word! While Tim, Joe, and I have extensive social media networks, we can still use all the help we can get. Seriously, some of us are still trying to figure out how to operate our phones.

   • Become an advocate and share the info

   • Click on the advocate link or scroll to the bottom

3. Matching gifts are a great way to encourage others to donate. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the matching designation.

   • Set up a Matching Gift

   • Enter dollar amount and decide if you will make the full gift regardless if the match is not completely met (check box)

   • Select “Other” and enter a dollar amount to give and check the “Per donor” box

   • Select the Match a designation box and select the designation you want to match

   • Fill out the rest of the form

Each year, September brings about conflicting emotions for me. I find myself lamenting the end of summer adventures and yet excited for the challenges of the upcoming track and field season.

This year is no different. My summer fun included three trips west. First, I spent three weeks with my family in the Washington and Oregon area which involved some backpacking on the Washington coast, four National Parks, and a few days at the Track and Field World Championships in Eugene. I also went on a rafting trip on the Yellowstone River in Montana with some high school friends. I was even able to squeeze in a “quick” weekend trip to summit Long’s Peak in Colorado with a former assistant coach (ProTip: hiking to 14,259ft without acclimating to altitude is challenging).

The excitement for the season was sufficiently elevated for the coaching staff and the team when the indoor track surface updates were completed a few weeks ago. It looks fantastic and feels great to run on! Consider this your sign to start training for this season’s alumni meet.

The athletes are excited for the new year, too. Clases only started on Monday, but many have already begun training on their own in small groups. Our athletes set big goals at the end of last season after winning both the indoor and outdoor MIAC Championships and are already putting in the work to make them happen. I will keep you updated on their progress throughout the year. We have a great group of returners and some strong freshmen to help out.

In the meantime, we have our annual Go Johnnies Challenge fundraising event next week on September 8th. This event has been an outstanding resource for our team and the entire SJU athletic department. Each year, the alumni and friends of the SJU Cross Country/Track and Field teams have donated nearly $20,000. Previously, that money has completely funded our trips to Oregon for the cross country team and California during the track season and we hope to do the same this year. Additionally, these funds will allow us to finish our record boards to highlight the great history of our teams.

Thank you for your continued support of the Johnnie Cross Country/Track and Field teams! Help us out by donating or sharing the information and follow along this season.

Thanks!

Jeremy and the entire SJU CC/TF Staff

Here are three ways you can help the cross country/track and field teams:

1. Donate: Support the Cross Country/Track & Field Teams through a donation. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the designation.

• Donate to the Go Johnnies Challenge

1. Spread the word! While Tim, Joe, and I have extensive social media networks, we can still use all the help we can get.

• Become an advocate and share the info

• Click on the advocate link or scroll to the bottom

1. Matching gifts are a great way to encourage others to donate. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the matching designation.

• Set up a Matching Gift

• Enter dollar amount and decide if you will make the full gift regardless if the match is not completely met (check box)

• Select “Other” and enter a dollar amount to give and check the “Per donor” box

• Select the Match a designation box and select the designation you want to match

• Fill out the rest of the form

There is much to write about at the end of the season and not enough time to sit down and write. Hopefully I’ll write more about the conference championship meet after the season. Just know that it went extremely well! The team performed beyond expectation and despite having a few key runners injured, the team was still able to come away with a big win.

This has been an extremely difficult year to qualify for Nationals. Many students are staying in college for a fifth year to use their eligibility from the Covid year. This year, Coach Joe and I optimistically rented a house after last year’s success at the National Championships in North Carolina where we had seven guys earn All-American honors. We were cutting it close and only had two athletes qualified after the MIAC Conference Championship meet: Maguire Petersen (Hutchinson, SR) in the high jump and decathlon and Brett Hague (Brainerd, JR) in the javelin. It was going to be a quiet week in the house if we didn’t qualify anyone else. Several of our guys were close to qualifying but needed good weather and favorable winds at the last chance meet.

The annual last chance meet at LaCrosse had smaller fields this year as many teams opted for Augustana College in Illinois. I regretted the decision to stick with LaCrosse as it stormed for most of the drive. After a brief lightning delay, we had some good times in the 100 but not fast enough to qualify. The 4x100 ran for the first time with Ryan Miller on the anchor leg and broke the school record with a time of 40.65. Good enough to qualify for Nationals. The sprinters came back in the 100 finals with Kevin Arthur running 10.43 to qualify for Nationals as well. Ryan Miller just missed with a 10.51 (10.64-10.67 is the usual cut off for qualifying). The storm rolled in and we moved inside to watch the vaulters. They had an outstanding meet with Shawn Schindler qualifying for Nationals with a vault of 4.86 meters.

Below is the schedule of when the guys compete this week and links for the live results and video. It will be a fun week!

Jeremy

Competition Schedule: central time

Thursday: ~10:30: Decathlon 100: Maguire Petersen

~11:15: Decathlon Long Jump

~12:25: Decathlon Shot Put

~1:45: Decathlon High Jump

~3:40: Decathlon 400

~4:25: 4x100 prelims

~4:45: Javelin: Brett Hague

Friday: ~9:00: Decathlon 110 Hurdles

~9:45: Decathlon Discus

~11:00: Decathlon Pole Vault

~1:00: High Jump: Maguire Petersen

~1:45: Decathlon Javelin

~2:45: 100 meter Prelims: Kevin Arthur

~3:30: Decathlon 1500

Saturday: ~11:00: Pole Vault: Shawn Schindler

~11:15: 4x100 Finals

~1:40: 100 Meter Finals

How to follow along:

Live Results

Live Video

Thank you to everyone who showed up for the alumni meet last weekend! I was impressed by the turnout. Apparently you all are starved for some track and field. Surprisingly, we had good weather and a few of us even got our first sunburn of the season. Of course, today (Thursday) it’s back to the unusually cold April and some snow.

We were treated with a number of impressive performances:

• Lukas Buehler (2016) dropped a strong 4:17 in the 1500m run.

• Matt Scherber (2013) still has some youth in his legs with his 15:22 run in the 5k.

• The alumni vault squad of Thomas Franek (2020), Ryan Bromenschenkel (1999), and Mike Leither(2008) placing 3rd, 6th, and 8th against the college guys.

• Collin Trout (2020)with a big win in the triple jump with a jump of 13.15m (43-1.75ft).

• Steve Dalhed (2005) apparently made use of our alumni meet layoff the last two years and impressed the young guys with his 54.24s in the 400m dash.

• The Alumni Performance of the Meet has to go to Jeff Eckstein (2000) for running a long leg of the 4x400m relay. He charged down the track to pick up the baton from an ailing teammate and ran nearly 540 meters. I’m not sure how the officials missed that one.

This week, our main meet was supposed to be at Gustavus today and was canceled because “sometimes it snows in April”. Thankfully, we lucked out by sending eleven of our athletes to California for the Bryan Clay Invitational. This is the biggest group SJU Track and Field has sent out west and they started competing this morning with Lloyd Young (Jr, Bloomington) in the 10k run. Lloyd won his heat (there were three heats!) with a time of 30:23.02. He is now second on the all-time list at SJU behind John Cragg’s 29:57.

Bryan Clay Invitational Live Results

Thanks again for all of the great alumni support. We appreciate everyone showing up for the alumni weekend. It is a special day to have familiar faces return to campus. Also, thank you for the donations which allows us to send the guys to California. They have been talking about this trip for quite awhile and were excited to be in some warm weather.

Next week we will be competing at Carleton on Saturday, April 23rd barring any more snow.

Jeremy

I didn’t write a proper summary for the end of the indoor season. I always expect to have some downtime as we continue to train and prepare for the outdoor season. Instead, we returned from a successful trip at the DIII indoor national championships and started hosting high school meets. We have hosted five meets in the last ten days. The largest meet was nine teams with 37 heats of the boys and girls 55 meter dash. Hopefully the weather improves because high school and college athletes alike are itching to compete outside.

If you didn’t see the results of our National Championships, we had a fun time down in North Carolina and the guys performed well. Eli Mollet (JR, Jefferson, SD) had a good series of throws to finish in twelfth place with a throw of 17.72 meters. Maguire Petersen (JR, Hutchinson) finished the heptathlon strong with a gutsy performance in the 1000 meters. He finished in sixth place overall to earn All-American honors. Special thanks to the Mollet family for a great meal while we were out there.

The outdoor season is off to a slow start. Our first home meet was canceled due to the Minnesota cold and we are scheduled to compete at Hamline on Saturday. Just enough time to get in one meet before we challenge the alumni. You all have about ten days to complete as much training as possible.

Use the link below to register. Whether you compete or not, we’d love to see you all in Collegeville on Saturday, April 9th. The meet starts at 11:00am with a social following at about 4:00pm.

Jeremy

CSB/SJU Alumni Meet Registration

The last time we were at the NCAA Indoor National Championships was also in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. We made it to the track for practice and then Covid hit. We were promptly sent home and watched reports as schools started sending students home. We had no clue we were embarking on the extended Covid shutdown.

We are back in Winston-Salem, North Carolina to attempt this again. We have two athletes qualified who both set school records this year. Eli Mollet is competing in the weight throw on Friday at 4:45 central time. Maguire Petersen is competing in the heptathlon and simultaneously in the open high jump. Maguire starts the heptathlon on Friday at 10:00am central time. His Saturday heptathlon also starts at 10:00am with the high jump starting at the same time. It will keep him busy.

Here are the links to follow along:

Live Results

Live Video

Our biggest challenge has already been conquered this week: we successfully transported the pole vault poles to North Carolina without any issues. Now we just enjoy the meet this weekend!

In true track coach fashion, I calculated the team scores for the MIAC conference meet ahead of time. On paper, it was going to be very close between us and Concordia-Moorhead. They have a good team with six guys who were able to win events, and a couple of those could win multiple events.

The meet started off great for SJU. The heptathletes placed 1st, 6th, and 7th. Maguire Petersen (Jr, Hutchinson) scored 5118 points to improve his school record and break the MIAC Championship record. Logan Hennen (So, Prior Lake) and Max Lelwica (Fr, Brainerd) performed well to score some unexpected points. Shortly after the heptathletes finished up on Friday with the 1,000m run, Eli Mollet (Jr, Jefferson, SD) also improved his school record in the weight throw with a toss of 18.18 meters.

From there, the Johnnies kept scoring points. We had multiple events where we scored three athletes in the top-eight and as a team, By the end of day one, we had scored more points than I expected. The second day brought much of the same and really showcased the depth of our team. Not only did we continue to score multiple athletes in many events, but we also had an athlete score points (top 8 finish) in all but one event. Results from the full meet are available at the MIAC Athletics website.

Meets like these are easy to coach. Basically, I just try to stay out of the way and let the athletes perform. I was able to watch more of the meet than any in the last year and got to enjoy the atmosphere. In the end, it turned into a rather decisive win for St. John’s and made for a rowdy bus ride home. A surprising amount of singing for much of the ride ranging from Billy Joel’s Piano Man to the Dropkick Murphys Shipping off to Boston and back to John Denver’s Country Roads.

This weekend is the Wartburg Last Chance Meet. The distance medley relay is going to take a crack at the school record of 10:19 on Friday and we have a handful of guys competing on Saturday to better their spots in the national rankings. After that, we will head to North Carolina for the NCAA National Championships.

Jeremy

For the first time in MIAC history, a team other than St. Thomas will win the MIAC Indoor Championship. Initially, I did not like the idea of St. Thomas leaving the conference as I thought it would reduce the competitiveness of our championship meets. Instead, their absence has added an excitement to the meet. Rather than teams competing for second and third place, several schools have the ability to win the team title. The depth in some events has suffered, yet nearly every event has nationally ranked athletes.

The MIAC Championships gets underway at 2:20pm on Thursday with the heptathlon. The top three entrants are nationally ranked 8th, 9th, and 12th. I included links below for the livestream and live results. Be sure to follow Maguire Petersen (Jr, Hutchinson) who is ranked 1st in conference, 8th Nationally, and the other Johnnies heptathlon athletes tomorrow.

It is hard to pick out a couple marquee events for the conference meet. We have athletes able to score in every event. Here are several events with Johnnies ranked high nationally:

• 60 meter dash: Kevin Arthur (SO, Champlin Park) and Ryan Miller (SR, Totino-Grace)

• Mile: Lloyd Young (SO, Bloomington) and Mitchell Grand (S), Hutchinson)

• Triple Jump: Michael Wallace (JR, Nassau, Bahamas) and Elijah Wade (SO, Waco, TX)

• Weight Throw: Eli Mollet (JR, Jefferson, SD) and Gavin Rupp (JR, Minnewaska)

New: Squad National Rankings. The coaches’ governing body started ranking teams by event. They take a school’s top four athletes in every event and rank them against all Division 3 schools. You need to have four athletes in each event in order to qualify, so some events won’t have Johnnie representation. Some of the SJU coaches are contending to see whose event group can get the best overall ranking. The competition is heating up as we near the end of the season. The top events so far are the weight throw (5th), pole vault (8th), and triple jump (9th). I’m predicting big changes this weekend! Stay tuned.

Hope you take time out of your workday to follow along.

Jeremy

Links for the weekend:

MIAC Indoor Championship Livestream

MIAC Live Results

We missed having the excitement from the alumni in our home opener, but I am looking forward to everyone being in attendance for our outdoor meet on April 9th. A tentative schedule will be sent your way in the next few weeks.

We have had some great performances in our first two meets. In our first home meet, Eli Mollet broke the weight throw record on his first throw to improve Tim Juba’s record from 17.43m to 17.45m. Then Eli smashed it on his next throw with a mark of 17.71 meters.

Check it out here and keep the volume on. Eli has a yell worthy of the school record toss.

SJU School record weight throw: 17.71 meters

Joe Vardas took the heptathletes up to NDSU last weekend. Maguire Petersen passed Mike Leither’s 4753 point school record from 2008 with 4,868 points. Maguire had solid performances in all events.

My other highlight is watching our pole vault coach, John Pollack work. I’m not sure I would be quite so bold as him after an athlete missed on consecutive attempts at opening height by not throwing his pole, a cardinal sin according to John. However, with one attempt left, John tells his athlete to just “Pass to the next height. Then the pole will go under the bar.” Bold! And it played out perfectly. The athlete clears the height (3.94m), doesn’t throw the pole, and it slides right under the bar. Movie script-worthy coaching by Pole Vault John. It’s like Hoosiers meets Top Gun. Joseph Charbonneau (SO, New Richmond WI) went on to clear the next three heights to finish the day in first place with a height of 4.39m (14ft 4.75in).

We have another home meet this Saturday starting at 11:00am. Spectators are allowed and we hope to see you here.

Meet Updates and Apparel Order

A quick update before I resume regular posts about the season. You may have heard by now that the “alumni” portion of our first indoor meet has been postponed to the outdoor season. Besides the obvious benefit of avoiding Covid, you all now have the opportunity to compete in an outdoor meet on April 9th. The postponement allows plenty of time to break out that old uniform, buy some new performance-enhancing spikes, and procure an injury from overzealous training. This is also a great time for all the throwers and steeplechasers to crawl out of hibernation and join the fun.

We are still set to compete on January 29th with the season looking more normal than the last. Disruptions to the season will undoubtedly emerge and we are prepared to make changes as necessary. As of today, here is our meet schedule:

Saturday, January 29th: Home

Friday, February 4th: at Macalester

Saturday, February 12th: Home

Friday, February 18th: Mankato

February 24-26th: MIAC Championships at Carleton

Saturday, March 5th: Last Chance at Wartburg

March 11-12: NCAA Championships in Winston-Salam, NC

Also, a couple of guys on the team put together this year's apparel order. The order information is attached. The deadline is Wednesday, January 19th at 8:00am.

Website: https://impactgroup.us/bigteamstore/

Passcode: SJUTF22

It’s been awhile and I hope to see you this year!

Jeremy

Joe and I finally made good on our attempt at a decathlon from last year’s Go Johnnies Challenge. Just in time for today’s fundraising efforts.

The SJU pole vault coach, John Pollack, also joined us as he couldn’t resist the opportunity to show us up. I think he felt bad about defeating us, so he put in extra time on the highlight video. Check it out:

2021 Coach Decathlon Highlights

As we finish up this year’s Go Johnnies Challenge, please consider donating to help us provide an outstanding experience for our student-athletes. Donations will not be used to cover any of our decathlon rehab/medical expenses! Details for donating are below.

I am continually impressed with our alumni support each year. You all have made SJU a great place to be a cross country/ track and field athlete.

Thank you for the support.

Jeremy

How to help

1. Support the Cross Country/Track & Field Teams through a simple donation. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the designation.

   1. Go Johnnies Challenge: Cross Country/Track & Field

2. Become an advocate and encourage and promote the event on any social media outlets. Tim, Joe, and I can use all the social media help we can get!

   1. 2021 Go Johnnies Challenge · GiveCampus

3. If so inclined, set up a matching gift that will encourage others to donate. Make sure to set Cross Country/Track & Field as the matching designation.

   1. Match 2021 Go Johnnies Challenge · GiveCampus

   1. Enter dollar amount and decide if you will make the full gift regardless If the match is not complete met (check box)

   2. Select “Other” and enter a dollar amount to give and check the “Per donor” box

   3. Select the Match a designation box and select the designation you want to match

   4. Fill out the rest of the form

Summer was a much needed break after the past year and I am disappointed it is already over. In a future post, I will share how I honed my inspiration and motivation skills for coaching while hiking my kids up mountains in Colorado. More importantly, the beginning of the school year is upon us and means reconnecting with the team, welcoming the first-year students, and the Go Johnnies Challenge.

Saint John’s will be doing our annual online fundraising event next week on Thursday, September 2nd. The fall fundraising event helps coaches plan for the upcoming year and has been invaluable in allowing us to expand opportunities for the team. We have used previous fundraising to cover travel expenses for cross country trips to Oregon and track and field trips to California. We are hopeful that we can resume those trips this year. We have an outstanding group of seniors and it would be fun to travel with them.

In the week leading up to the Go Johnnies Challenge, Joe and I will be making good on our promise from last year: for every ten donors, we would compete/complete one event of the decathlon. With over 100 donors, we are reluctantly doing the decathlon. We have both battled injuries this year and will hobble to the start line next week.

We will be posting some likely embarrassing videos and results next week leading up to the September 2nd fundraising event.

Details: Go Johnnies Challenge

The website is currently up and you can donate anytime before the end of the day on September 2nd.

If I’m being honest, I was disappointed in our conference meet this year. We finished in a commanding second place, but I thought we would be closer to St. Thomas in their final MIAC Championship. On paper, it looked like it would be a close team score. However, St. Thomas had some big performances and we were a little flat. I hypothesized that the combination of our block schedule ending the first day of the meet, some guys taking a final that morning, and many guys receiving their second vaccine dose that week all contributed to an average meet.

I try not to write about the lackluster performances we sometimes have, but it is worth mentioning now based on their performances at the National Championships. The pole vaulters and the 4x100m relay team had high expectations for the MIAC meet. We had the top two vaulters in the conference and the top 4x100m team. After a no height and a surprise second place finish in the relay, I wasn’t sure what to expect at the National Championships. How would Drew Dockendorf (JR, Holdingford) bounce back after the conference meet? I thought the 4x100m team had underperformed all year, but will they put it together at Nationals? Could Shawn Schindler (JR, Maple Grove) stay hot and keep vaulting this well?

The guys were in a great mood at Nationals. It was fun to take eight athletes and three coaches down to North Carolina. The weather was hot, humid, and we nearly lost our pole vault poles before we even got started. Side note: if anyone wants to start a company to transport pole vault poles, you would be saving coaches many hours of consternation.

At Nationals, it didn’t take long to answer some of my performance questions. The 4x100m relay kicked things off with a season best by nearly .4 seconds and the second fastest time in school history. Jack Young (JR, Rocori) ran an outstanding leadoff leg and held his own against some of the top sprinters in the country. Kevin Arthur (SO, Champlin Park) has really found another gear in the last three weeks of the season and put us in a great spot for Brady Labine (JR, Detroit Lakes) and Ryan Miller (JR, Totino-Grace) to finish strong.

I don’t even know what to say about the vaulters. That was simultaneously the most nerve-racking and exciting event to watch. Both Shawn and Drew went to their third attempt at opening height (15-1). Were these guys going to no-height at the National meet? Thankfully, both cleared opening height or we were going to have two crabby vaulters and an inconsolable vault coach for the rest of the trip. Then, more excitement after a couple more misses at the second height (15-7), but eventually both cleared again. A bunch of the vaulters started to congratulate each other because after only two heights, they were already down to eight vaulters and were All-Americans. In the end, Shawn finished in fourth place and Drew in sixth place.

Maguire Peterson (SO, Hutchinson) tackled both the high jump and javelin. He was still recovering from his MIAC win in the decathlon and hadn’t been able to practice much in either event leading up to NCAA’s. He pulled off a four-way tie for eighth place in the high jump and immediately had to go to javelin. Next time we will ask for a better event schedule.

In the 100m dash, Kevin continued his streak of 10.6’s with a 10.64sec in prelims for tenth place. Not too bad for squeaking into the meet at the last chance meet! Ryan ran his fastest time of the season in prelims with a 10.50sec. After a rough start in finals, he finished strong for a third place finish with a time of 10.58sec.

The team finished in twelfth place with 19.25 points. Everyone went home as an All-American. It was a fun group to spend the week with, especially with Coaches Joe and John and our alternate Matt Gish (JR, Bemidji) who did a great job keeping tabs on everyone and being ready to go if he was needed. Thank you to everyone who was keeping tabs on results or watching the live stream. We were especially heartened to hear the livestream announcers share a request from Twitter asking to replay a prelim race for our guys that had been skipped- we have the best fans! Texts from alums and friends were rolling in all weekend, so we knew you were out there cheering for us. Overall, it was a great trip.

Now we are trying to finish up recruiting for the year at the Minnesota State Track Meet later this week and then on to summer.

The preparation for last week’s Last Chance Qualifier in LaCrosse and this week’s NCAA National Championships in Greensboro, NC hasn’t left much time for writing.

To summarize our conference meet; we finished where I thought we would. I expected to be a little closer to St. Thomas in the team scores, but they had an outstanding meet. The combination of some Johnnies taking a final on Friday before competing and several getting their second vaccination shot that week didn’t help performances. We had some areas where we underperformed, but also had several strong performances.

In a big surprise, the sprinters were upset in the 4x100m relay. St. Mary’s continues to have strong relay- they were also at the National Championships in 2019. Both teams have qualified for Nationals this week and the matchup is setting up a good rivalry. However, our guys came back and performed well in the open 100m and 200m dashes later that day. Several season bests and PR’s. The guys were excited after finishing 2nd, 3rd, and 5th in the 200m.

The MIAC is always tough for distance runners and this year proved no different. Alexei Hensel (SO, Buffalo) and Nate Clausing (SO, Big Lake) had big PR’s to score points in the 800m run. Tommy Allen (FY, St. Paul Academy) and Mitch Grand (SO, Hutchinson) also ran well in the 1500m run. The gutsiest performance had to be Lloyd Young’s 10k. Several runners, including Lloyd, got sucked along to an extremely fast, early pace. Most of those runners suffered and went into survival mode to finish. Lloyd struggled as well, but at no point did he just phone it in. He gave it everything and still came back the next day to run a good 5k.

After the conference meet, we are always in a rush to get people home and move on to the Last Chance Meet. We had a big group of twenty-one athletes who wanted to extend their track season. The big news is that we were able to sneak two extra athletes into Nationals based on their last chance performances. Shawn Schindler (JR, Maple Grove) cleared 15-11.25ft for a big PR of 4 inches in pole vault. With Shawn, we knew he had a good chance and was on the cusp of qualifying. I did not predict or see Kevin Arthur (SO, Champlin Park) qualifying. He already had big PR’s at the conference meet by running 10.81 seconds in the 100m dash and 21.87s in the 200m dash. Both were big improvements over his high school bests of 11.36s and 22.53s. He had a great start in his prelim race in LaCrosse and ran strong for a time of 10.62!

Now on to the National Championships. We are currently in Greensboro, NC and getting ready to head to the track for practice. Of course, we need to go for Covid testing first. We have a big group of athletes with our 4x100 team (Jack Young, Kevin Arthur, Brady Labine, and Ryan Miller), both Ryan and Kevin in the 100m, Drew Dockendorf and Shawn Schindler in the pole vault, and Maguire Petersen in the high jump and javelin. The schedule of their events is below with the link for the livestream.

Thanks for following along this year!

Jeremy

National Championships Livestream

Eastern Times

Thursday:

3:15 4x100 prelims

3:30 Pole Vault

Friday:

2:30 High Jump

3:45 100 Prelims

4:45 Javelin

Saturday:

12:15 4x100 Finals

1:40 100 Finals

The end of the season comes quickly and the last few weeks go by in a blur. Last night’s meet at St. Thomas went well with some standout events. I will highlight those below. Before I get to the highlights, the MIAC Championships kick off today with the first day of the decathlon. The Johnnies have three entrants: Maguire Petersen (FR, Hutchinson), Mason DeGross (SO, New Prague), and Logan Hennen (FR, Prior Lake).

Rather than pay attention to your Zoom meetings today, I encourage all of you to watch the Livestream of the decathlon instead. Maguire enters the meet seeded second and it should be a good competition. The top three seeds faced each other at the SJU Decathlon three weeks ago. The winner at that meet was decided in the 1500 as Lukas Walton from Bethel had a big 1500 to take the lead from Maguire. Not far behind was the Tommie’s top decathlete Drew Probst in third. The scores were tight with Bethel at 6053, Maguire at 5965, and St. Thomas at 5888. Tune in to see how the rematch plays out. Here is the schedule and links so you can plan your work day.

Approximate Schedule:

Thursday

• 12:00 100 meters

• 12:45 Long Jump

• 2:30 Shot Put

• 3:45 High Jump

• 6:30 400 meter

Friday

• 10:30 110 Hurdles

• 11:20 Discus

• 1:00 Pole Vault

• 4:15 Javelin

• 5:45 1500
  

Decathlon Live Results

Livestream Decathlon Coverage

Last Night's Highlights

Despite the cool, rainy evening, the Johnnies had some outstanding performances. The 800 meter runners tried to take the spotlight away from the vaulters. St. Thomas provided a good rabbit and pulled our guys along to a hot first lap. Alexei Hensel (SO, Buffalo) was the top Johnnie at 1:56.01. Nate Clausing (FR, BIg Lake) dropped two seconds and ran an identical 1:56.01. Coming in close behind was Tommy Allen (FR, St. Paul Academy) at 1:56.85, Mitchell Grand (SO, Hutchinson) at 1:57.48, and Will Mattock (SO, Maryville, MO) at 1:57.60.

Not to be outdone, the vaulters took the top-4 places led by a big Shawn Schindler (JR, Maple Grove) PR of 4.76 meters (15-7.25). Drew Dockendor (JR, Holdingford) vaulted 15-1, Joe Stauffer (SO, Cambridge) went 14-7.5, and freshman Joe Charbonneau (New Richmond, WI) cleared 14-1.75.

I will provide a quick outlook for the rest of the MIAC Championships early next week. Enjoy the decathlon!

Jeremy

I mentioned last week how we were all looking forward to heading out on the road for a meet. While it was good to be in the rhythm of traveling to a meet, I’m not sure it outweighs the lengthy day we had on Saturday.

Some of you will remember the NDSU meet a few years ago when they scrambled to find officials as the meet started. I remember most of the team trying to get out of the cold by sitting on the bus, eating pizza, and watching our triple jumpers who didn’t start until well after the running events were over.

That meet, coincidentally, fell on the same weekend. Saturday was truly a full day of work. We departed at 6:30am and made it back to Collegeville by 11:30pm. With over fifty men’s hammer throwers and the same amount of women, the meet was destined to take awhile. There was some grumbling by the runners as the running events also fell over one hour behind. Despite the schedule, we still had some good performances.

The big highlight of the meet was the return of Drew Dockendorf (JR, Holdingford). Drew has been out since the indoor season with a stress fracture. He was cleared by his doctor and our athletic trainer to vault two days each week. He is not allowed to run other than while vaulting and is only allowed to do short approach vaults. We have to be a little creative to accomplish some training and adjust his warmups. Despite the short approach, Drew cleared 4.70 (15-5) and entered the national rankings.
The distance guys missed all of the South Dakota fun and opted for a meet at Hamline with some strong competition. The main report from our expert coaching staff of Tim Miles and Maxwell Kuzara was their excitement about the low cost of pizzas after the meet. After checking the results, the big highlight was obviously Mitchell Grand’s (SO, Hutchinson) win in the 1500 with a time of 3:55.90

This week, we are at St. Thomas on Friday with a 3:30pm start time. We will have some tough competition through all events as Bethel, Augsburg, and St. Mary’s (with the #1 4x100 in the MIAC) will be there.

Hope to see you there!

JKG

Johnnies in the National Rankings

#6: Ryan Miller in the 100: 10.65

#8: Maguire Petersen in the high jump: 6-8.75

#9: Maguire Petersen in the Javelin: 192-5

#16: Maguire Petersen in the decathlon: 5965 points

#16: Drew Dockendorf in the pole vault: 15-5

#20: 4x100: 42.05

#21: Shawn Schindler in the pole vault: 15-3

#31: Michael Wallace in the triple jump: 45-11

#38: Mitchell Grand in the 1500: 3:55.90

The Johnnies finished up with our eighth home meet of the year and I am excited to be on the road this weekend. There are benefits to competing at home, but most of us are welcoming a change of scenery. I want to thank all our officials, meet workers, student workers, SJU athletic trainers and facilities crew for helping to pull off this string of home meets. Most importantly, the rest of the track and field coaching staff put in a great deal of time and effort to host good meets. The secret to hosting a good meet: get yourself a Joe Vardas.

The big highlight of last week’s meet was the debut of our decathletes. The decathlon offers great entertainment to see the strengths and weaknesses of each athlete, the overall score lead changes, and which athletes rise to the occasion despite the grueling event circumstances. Even our student workers and athletic trainers got into the excitement by following along. By the end, these (non-track) student staff knew all of the athletes and were discussing the outcome after each event.

A quick story from the decathlon: our freshman Logan Hennen (Prior Lake), did not plan on doing the decathlon in college. He didn’t really plan on doing track in college, either; he was going to play football and would consider vaulting. With no football in the fall, he showed up to a few practices and it didn’t take us long to plant the idea of doing the decathlon. He embraced the idea and has trained well.

As the decathlon 1500 neared on Sunday, Logan had a look of apprehension. My go-to coaching move is to avoid talking to those guys. I’ll let them know I’m available if needed, and most times, they will decide on their own to compete. I’m sure most people can picture that look of near-dread that says “please, don’t make me do this.” It’s a similar look to the guys on the B team 4x400 meter relay as they look at their relay alternates who are staring at their shoes or all-of-sudden walking with a limp.

Nine events in, Logan went to see the athletic trainer because he was feeling “rough.” I chalked it up to fatigue and maybe a little fear of how the 1500m run would feel. I wasn’t sure if he would get on the track. Our athletic trainer, Holly gave him a pep talk and sent him on his way. The heavy winds and rain created quite the dramatic backdrop and in the end, Logan got it done and completed his first decathlon. It wasn’t pretty, that last event of the decathlon rarely is; but the best part is that Logan finished the race and went to the athletic training room the next day to thank Holly for the help.

I’ll provide an update on national rankings next week. This weekend we have split the team between two meets. The distance runners are heading to Hamline on Saturday evening for a 7:30pm start and the rest of us are headed to Northern State in Aberdeen, SD on Saturday for a noon start for field events and 2:00pm start for track events.

Have a good weekend,

JKG

PS. All this talk about decathlons might have you thinking, “What happened to that coaches decathlon that I donated to see happen?” My best answer is it’s a work in progress. It’s been a challenging several months for everyone, your favorite track coaching staff included. However, we are training and can report with certainty that these events were a lot easier to do when we were 20. When it happens, we’ll make sure you hear about it.