#49 - The Missing Newsletter

Author

Jeff Hollobaugh
July 26, 2024

Inside This Issue

Forsyth Still Blazing

With a season that doesn’t end until the World U20 Championships in Peru, Pioneer’s Rachel Forsyth is still making history with her senior season. At the Ontario U20 & Open Championships in Toronto, she raced against the older athletes in both the 1500 and 800.

In the 1500 on July 20, she finished 5th in 4:17.00, a state record that broke the 4:18.44 standard that Grosse Pointe South’s Hannah Meier set at the 2012 USATF Junior Championships. The next day she finished 6th in the 800 in 2:06.06 after going out in 61.79. It’s the No. 5 performance in state history.

The World U20 meet is from August 27-31.

(Quick note here: our stats and everything else at Michtrack follow the policy that Track & Field News devised more than 7 decades ago and still follows. An athlete remains a high schooler until August 31 following their senior year, or until they start college, if that happens to be earlier. And college-credit courses taken while still a high schooler don’t factor in.)

Beadlescomb Bounces Back

One of the guys we really hoped would make the Olympic team is Morgan Beadlescomb, but a harsh reality of the sport is that bad days happen even for the best of them. A 2016 graduate of Algonac High, where he won two D2 titles at 1600 as well as in cross country, Beadlescomb then competed for Michigan State. As a Spartan he was a 3-time All-American in cross country. On the track he won Big 10 titles at 5000 and 10,000 and was NCAA runner-up in both the indoor mile and the outdoor 5000.

Now working with coach Ron Warhurst and the Very Nice Track Club, Beadlescomb is sponsored by adidas and has become one of the nation’s best. A 5000 PR of 13:03.57 over the winter speaks to that. However at the Olympic Trials, he struggled to an 11th-place finish in 13:37.69, an experience he called “abysmal.”

It’s great to see him bounce back. In his first Diamond League meet (London, July 20), he ran a PR of 3000 in 7:36.10. That slashed his outdoor best from 7:45.50 and leapfrogged him over some significant Olympians on the Michigan HS alumni all-time list, namely Dathan Ritzenhein, Brian Diemer and Todd Williams. Now he sits at No. 2, behind American Record holder Grant Fisher.

On Wednesday at the British Milers Club meet at Tooting Bec, he placed 5th in the A 1500 at 3:36.18, his No. 2 time ever.

More News

  • At that London 3000 race, Grant Fisher took 2nd in 7:27.99, the No. 2 time in U.S. history after his own American Record.

  • At the Kite Vault (7/20) at the Vault Barn, Sam Vesperman jumped a PR 15-6 to take the men’s win over Tryce Tokar’s 15-6. Kenzie Fedewa led the women at 12-6. Ashley Verplank was 2nd at 12-0. Top preps were Isabel German and Allison Shelton, tied for 3rd at 11-6.

  • Flint’s Genessee Swift Invite (7/20) produced some good age group performances.

  • At Tooting Bec (7/24), Pioneer alum Nick Foster ran 3:39.18, leading from where the rabbit dropped until the final turn to place 5th in the B 1500.

  • Abigail Russell is not done yet! The Michigan-bound thrower gave the hammer a whirl at the Shamrock Throws Series at Catholic Central (7/24), and broke the state record with her 156-7. The old record was the 155-10 thrown by Farmington’s Valadian Pallet in 2020. Russell’s series went 150-9, 156-7, 156-0, f, f, 151-0 and had 4 of the 9 longest throws of all-time. Russell also won the shot at 45-9. Sophomore Paxton Heitsch took the boys hammer at 148-9.

  • A state record missed! In looking at Paxton Heitsch’s mark, we found out from his dad that he threw 162-5 at adidas Nationals. That’s very significant, as it’s a 2-inch improvement on the state 10th grade record, set by Josh DeVries of Portage Northern in 2018.

Michtrack Interview: Grand Haven’s Seth Norder

Norder winning at Brooks PR.

Grand Haven’s Seth Norder came into his senior year with big expectations. In cross country, he had been runner-up in the D1 Finals as a junior. On the track, he was defending D1 champion in the 3200, after running 4:10.01 for the mile and 8:46.33 for the 3200. As a senior, he won the cross country crown in 14:54.3. To focus on training, he only raced one late season 800 indoors. He won the Barnyard Mile in 4:06.22. At Distance Night Under the Lights at Houseman Field, he doubled with an 800 PR of 1:52.48 followed by a 9:10.53 for 3200. Then at the D1 Finals, he crushed the 1600 field with a 4:03.01, continuing to the mile in 4:04.42. He covered his final 800 in just 1:59.20. He only ran two post-season races but he made them count, with stunning victories in the miles at Brooks PR (4:01.94) and at Nike (4:02.20) just four days later. After only sub-4:00 guys Grant Fisher and Hobbs Kessler, he is the No. 3 miler in state history. Now he’s camping and kayaking before he throws himself into training for his MSU cross country debut this fall, but he made time to catch up with us.

Michtrack: How did you end up feeling about your senior year?

Norder: I was really happy with it. I think cross country went okay. Maybe I was hoping for a little bit more, but then anything that I felt like I was lacking, definitely track season made up for it. That was way better than I ever could have expected, so I was really happy with that.

Michtrack: Your 1600 race at the MHSAA Finals at East Kentwood was pretty amazing. Did that go according to plan?

Norder: My plan going into it was just to win. I wasn't really too focused on it at the time. I was hoping that would come in a week or two following, so it was just a win, and I think I won that in a pretty convincing way. I was happy with my final kick, so I was really happy with how that went. I felt like I executed well.

Michtrack: Your postseason, your trip out west, that had to have come out better than anyone imagined.

Norder: To be honest, I wasn't even really going for a win at Brooks. I felt like top three at either of those races would have been a really good result. I felt really good with 400 to go. Kicked into 3rd, but those first two guys kind of came back to me. Crossing that line felt pretty sweet. 

Michtrack: It looked like they had been hammering it, I suspect, in the hopes of breaking 4:00, but you were hanging back. Was sub-4:00 not something you were aiming at, or did you just want to see how it turned out?

Norder: It was definitely in the back of my mind, but the pace I was going was faster than I'd ever went out in a mile, so I wanted to make sure I was going out at a pace that I know I could keep up, and if I felt good at the end, kick with everything I have. I didn't really want to blow up, especially with it being one of my last races.

[At Nike] I felt like I had nothing to lose because I had won Brooks. I had a lot more confidence going into that one, so I wasn't in the front, but I was in striking distance to the leaders more than I was at Brooks, and I took the lead a little earlier in that race. I didn't really feel much pressure, but the goal was still to win.

Michtrack: You beat some people who ran faster than you this year. Would you characterize yourself more as a guy who would prefer to win, or would prefer to run fast times?

Norder: I think of myself more as a racer. When I'm alone in races, I can run well, but not the way I can race if I've got someone down the final stretch with me. I'm really competitive. I don't like to lose. When there's competitors with me, it just brings an extra gear for me that I might not have racing alone.

Michtrack: I'm sure people wondered after your 8:46 as a junior, if you were going to go after the state record in the 3200. Did you end up deciding not to go after 3200, or was it just that things didn't fall into place?

Norder: That was the goal coming into the year. The plan was to go after it at Shepherd, but then I got the stomach flu or something right after Barnyard, which sucked because I felt like Barnyard went really well. Obviously, I don't know what kind of shape I was in, but I was pretty confident I was in good shape. I don't know how good of shape, so it was a little disappointing. I never really got another great opportunity. I started focusing on the mile after that. I think the mile is my better distance.

Michtrack: The first time I started seeing your name was when you were pretty young and you were running with Paul McMullen's Chariots of Fire club

Norder: Yeah, I think I was 8 or 9 years old. I ran a lot back then. Then in middle school and my freshman year, I don't know if I'd say I had a lull—I don't think I was at my full potential. I wasn't training crazy, but I feel like I kind of got back to that level my sophomore year and never looked back.

Michtrack: What kind of influence was Paul McMullen on you?

Norder: Definitely a big influence. He taught me to live life, be more adventurous. We did a lot of adventure runs, trail runs, we didn't know where we were going to end up. Just see where the run took us. He was a great guy. Someone to model your life after.

Losing him was a pretty… it was not a great time. I know he's looking down on me and all the other chariots. I just want to make him proud. He was there when I first started running. Got me into my love of running. I’m doing anything I can do to carry his name on.

Michtrack: I think he'd be pretty proud of this year you just had. Looking ahead, what's your outlook going into college?

Norder: I’m really excited. Who knows what will happen in college. A lot of things happen. Some people get really good, some people don't really pan out. I'm just going to try to control the things I can control. Hope for the best outcome. I've got a lot of faith in the program. I wouldn't be attending MSU next year if that wasn't the case. I'm excited to see what I can do.

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Other Things

  • RIP Bob Ritsema: The coach of Brighton’s boys for 50 years, he passed away this week. His memorial will be August 29 at the First United Methodist Church on Grand River in Brighton (time TBD). Former Brighton XC runners are asked to wear their old team attire and help make it an orange and black event.

  • RIP Paul Piwinski: a belated notice that the former MSU high jump All-American passed away in Atlanta on March 29. As a high schooler at Warren Cousino, he was the 1978 Class A state champ. His son Brandon was the D1 HJ champion for DeLaSalle in 2015. His obituary.

  • Paris newsletters: I may do daily mini-newsletters from Paris to stay abreast of Team Michigan. All depends on time & connectivity.

  • The Missing Newsletter: I’ve decided it’s this one that we’re giving the No. 49 label to. The numbers guy decided it was too bothersome to have it not exist.

  • Speaking of numbers, I recently did a Facebook/Instagram post to brag about winning the lifetime achievement award from the Track & Field Writers of America. In it I mentioned that Paris would be my 10th Olympics. The thought that made me jump out of bed in a panic the next morning was that I doublechecked myself and realized that it will only be Olympics #9 because I missed Sydney 2000. I corrected the posts right away, but the statistician in me is still embarrassed.

  • The Shepherd 3000: Because we’re stat geeks, we love that the Shepherd Bluejay organizers go the extra step and get 3000 splits for their Elite 3200, just like they do at nationals. Why is it important? Once they leave high school, these athletes will never run 3200 again, but 3000 is a common college/world distance. This year the boys results were jumbled, something Detroit Mercy coach Guy Murray noticed when no one else did. He brought it to our attention, and director Carey Hammel figured out the problem and fixed it, correcting PRs for a lot of the athletes in the race. That attention to detail matters! The results.

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