#97 - State Meet Thrills

Inside This Issue

• The Greatest Run of the Day

• The Evolution of the MIS Girls Record

• Surviving The Perfect Storm

• The MITCA Extravaganza

• Is XC Anyone’s Favorite Sport?

• Other Things

The Greatest Run of the Day

For our money, the best run of the day, boys or girls, came from Pioneer soph Natasza Dudek, who blasted the fastest 5K cross country race in state history with her 16:09.5. We don’t use the term “state record” in cross country, because it’s a futile attempt to compare apples and oranges, and any such compilation would favor the state’s flattest, fastest course. Course records, though, can be something special. And there is no course that is worthy of accolades more than the MIS circuit, in its 30th year of bringing all the best in the Lower Peninsula together for the biggest honors.

Dudek’s performance was a solo run from the start. She hammered through the miles in 5:09.6, 5:19.2 (10:28.8) and 5:11.4 (15:40.2), sprinting the final stretch in 29.3. She sliced 19 seconds off the already imposing record 16:28.5 set by another Pioneer, Rachel Forsyth, two years ago. She had a winning margin of 55.2 seconds over runner-up Rachel Smith of Okemos.

The fastest boys race of the day was the 14:50.6 that Kamari Ronfeldt produced in the D1 race, a very different sort of contest that saw him win on the kick by a mere 2.2 seconds. It was the first time in Class A/D1 history that both individual winners came from the same school.

There were myriad other amazing performances on the first day of November, but others have covered them better than I (and a lot quicker!).

The Evolution of the MIS Girls Record

18:57.2 - Kristin Bishop (Kalamazoo Christian) 1996
17:52.6 - Sharon Van Tuyl (Portage Northern) 1996
17:51.9 - Katie Boyles (Rochester Adams) 1998
17:17.1 - Katie Boyles (Rochester Adams) 2000
17:10.1 - Megan Goethals (Rochester) 2008
16:54.8 - Megan Goethals (Rochester) 2009
16:52.1 - Olivia Theis (Lansing Catholic) 2017
16:28.5 - Rachel Forsyth (Ann Arbor Pioneer) 2023
16:09.5 - Natasza Dudek (Ann Arbor Pioneer) 2025

Surviving the Perfect Storm

Year 29 of being a part of the MIS announcing crew promised to be the toughest one yet, all because of a confluence of challenges that all hit that week. For starters, I was sick as a dog, and went all week wondering if I would have a voice on Saturday. Then it was a deadline week at work, which means I had hardly any time to do my usual prep work before the meet. Then someone scheduled Halloween for the night before, and that meant being part of the experience for my grandkids and handing out candy at their door while they trick-or-treated with their parents. As if that wasn’t enough, I had to drop my wife off at Metro Airport at 3am in the morning so that she could vacation without me! So on a whopping 2 hours of sleep, we handled the state finals…. and lived.

Needless to say, I couldn’t have done it without my daughter Katy, who has been helping me at this meet since she was 7. And my sincere appreciation goes to George Tilt, the voice that tied it all together, as well as Rudy Godefroidt, the head official and ace cart driver. And of course Cody Inglis of the MHSAA, the sound people, and all the other officials and volunteers who helped us out.

Announcing a cross country meet is weird. It’s massively different than announcing the D1 finals in track, where almost everyone hears every word I say (not always a good thing). At MIS, the only way to hear much is to hang out in the finish area all day. At best, most athletes and coaches only hear bits and pieces of our commentary, usually for the races they are not involved with.

XC is tough because of the brutal logistical challenge of finding a way to see the whole race and have access to a working mic. I’ve announced a few other XC events. Some have proved difficult but manageable (the Big 10), while others unnamed have proved to be impossible. Somehow we’ve made it work at MIS, and we are probably one of the few XC meets in the nation that accomplishes this. It’s with deep appreciation to people like Duane Raffin, Charlie Janke and Nate Hampton that we are proud to continue.

The MITCA Extravaganza

The week after MIS came the Meet of Champions at Shepherd, where a fast course and spirited competition made the 6th annual running of it an essential part of the season for everyone who participated. Meet manager Dave Lustig is spot-on when he talks about it being “one of the coolest cross country events around.”

The numbers are impressive. Just looking at the results, there were 1,490 finishers. At $22 each for early registration, that’s over $32,000, before spectator numbers ($5 each) are taken into account. Plus 16 or so sponsors. And $3,000 in scholarships handed out. Other meets would kill for numbers like that!

This year’s results

Emma Hoffman won the girls elite team race in 16:45.1 ahead of Rachel Smith (17:03.9) and Alex Scappaticci (17:19.2). Kamari Ronfeldt took the boys in 14:56.5 ahead of teammate Beckett Crooks (15:00.7) and Marek Butkiewicz (15:05.3).

One important part of the meet that shouldn’t be lost in the shuffle is that it functions as the selection meet for the Mideast Meet of Champions in Kettering, Ohio, on Saturday. For nearly 40 years the best seniors in Michigan have been battling against Ohio and Indiana (and occasionally other states).

The Boys team (in order of finish): David Dubeck (Clarkston), Gabe Litzner (Sault Ste Marie), Ian Morgan (Okemos), Brody Karg (Harbor Beach), Ryan Barnes (Clarkston), Harper Wesley (Utica), Caleb Keller (Traverse City Central), Nathaniel Linden (Clarkston), Finn Gamerath (Walled Lake Northern), Evan Owczarek (Rochester), Noah Johnston (Caledonia), Dylan Pascoe (Rochester).

The Girls: Hailey Creisher (Leslie), Talya Schreiber (Pickford), Elliana Neuer (Hartland), Hope Miller (Blissfield), Lilah Yoder (Forest Hills Central), October Harns (Okemos), Leah Corby (Stoney Creek), Juliet Lewis (Brighton), Ella Fure (Marquette), Gracelin Martin (Greenville), Aviana Skinner (Grand Ledge), Ella Abraham (Rochester).

There were top senior runners who opted not to join the team for Ohio—the Kettering race is the day before the NXR Midwest event, which will feature some of our state’s top runners.

Is XC Really Anyone’s Favorite Sport?

Before you get riled up, hear me out. This is not an anti-XC post! It’s just something that was bouncing around in my head after leaving MIS amazed by the size of the crowds.

For years as a coach, I heard runners ask each other all the time, “What do you like best, cross country or track?” The answer usually was cross country. There’s a certain happiness that comes from racing on grass and dirt and mud. The crowds at a state meet or at a major college event are large and excited.

So what’s the problem? Well, where are the pros? If XC is all that wonderful and more, you’d think that all of us fans would be in huge support of cross country races for post-collegians. We’re not—if we were, then those kind of races would have taken off. Instead, the few attempts I have seen over the years at creating cross country events for pros have failed miserably.

The USA will be hosting the World XC Championships in Tallahassee on January 10. In terms of importance, this is huge. Crowds will probably be pretty big, though nowhere near as large as for an early-season NBA game between two lousy teams. The selection race for choosing the U.S. team will be held as part of the NXN Nationals. Great idea, don’t get me wrong. For years we have seen what happens when the selection race stands on its own. It flounders, and it doesn’t take many fingers to count the crowd. Once athletes are out of college, even their parents don’t come to watch them anymore. Suddenly that sport that we are so passionate about when athletes are running for schools is a lonely trek around a deserted cornfield.

Among those competing this year for a spot on the senior teams will be a few of our best runners, but many, such as Grant Fisher, will be missing. There’s no real money in XC, after all. For Tallahassee, here’s the prize money: “US$30,000 for 1st, US$15,000 for 2nd, US$10,000 for 3rd, graduating down to US$3000 for a sixth place finish.” For a real pro, that is not enough to dedicate an entire training cycle to, especially when one figures that Kenyans and Ethiopians will take home most of the loot. So the pros we will see are the ones for whom this fit into their training cycle for the rest of the year.

Maybe Seb Coe has the answer. The head of World Athletics has been campaigning for years to get cross country back into the Olympics, as a Winter Olympic sport. He thinks he’s getting close to finding the support he needs in the IOC. Maybe if there’s gold on the line, more athletes will make cross country choices after college. Maybe their parents will even show up.

The Newsletter

This is the part that has been worrying me for months. This newsletter has gotten immeasurably harder for me to produce this fall, mostly because of changes in the needs of my family. Not a bad thing—family comes first.

However, as you have noticed, my “weekly” newsletter that hasn’t been weekly for a while is going to stay on an irregular and more infrequent schedule. If I’m blessed with the gift of time now and then, I’ll be thrilled to crank one out. If some of my regular sponsors decide to cut their contributions to Michtrack, I understand.

However, the Michtrack historical work continues. My focus now is the next class of inductees to the Michigan Track & Field Hall of Fame. That means my time will be going to research, writing, and publishing some newsletters with the announcements.

Other Things

• The second woman to make the time qualifier for the ‘28 Olympic Trials was Megan O’Neil with her 2:36:45 (2:36:43 chip) at Twin Cities. The alum of Remus Chippewa Hills and CMU now competes for Hansons-Brooks Distance Project. Her highest finish in the cross country state meet was her 3rd as a frosh in the 2010 D2 race.

• Rachel McCardell qualified for the Trials at Chicago, placing 16th in 2:34:31. The Northwestern alum did her prep running at Birmingham Seaholm. She placed 6th in the D1 XC Finals as a senior in 2017, and the next spring was 6th at New Balance Nationals in the mile.

• Gabby Hentemann - The Grand Haven grad, who went on to run for Oklahoma State, gave the marathon a whirl (a good stretch for someone who won the D1 800 crown as a senior). She placed 4th in Indianapolis in 2:34:27, qualifying for the Trials.

• Incidentally, if anyone notices other Michiganders qualifying for the marathon trials, drop me a line. It’s really easy to miss these athletes on my radar, because success comes after years of toiling off the radar. It can be even tougher to spot the women, as some are competing under married names unknown to me by the time they qualify.

• Pol Molins - The name might ring a bell—as an exchange student from Spain he ran for Benzie Central in the 22-23 school year. Since then he’s run 800 in 1:49.56, 1500 in 3:44.11 and 3000 in 8:11.72. During the ‘26 season you will see him competing for Illinois.

• Don Sleeman is retiring from coaching after 58 years at the helm of the Ann Arbor Pioneer boys program. As you can see from the results of the season, the man is still one of our finest coaches.

• Gerard Donakowski - One of the all-time greats from Dearborn Heights Riverside and the University of Michigan, he is now facing some serious challenges as a result of multiple surgeries and the amputation of a leg. Please, visit the GoFundMe established by his family for details on how you can help. https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-gerard-donakowski-recover-from-a-midthigh-amputation

• RIP: Paul Babits. The 1979 Class A pole vault champ from Redford Union, he passed away in Fort Wayne on October 15 at the age of 64.

• Tip Jar: If you want to support the ongoing historical work of Michtrack, and help us prepare for a planned expansion of that work in the next few years, please consider a continuing donation to our non-profit.