GREENWAY/NASHWAUK-KEEWATIN
Will Floersheim was a cross country runner for Little Falls in high school. He was not able to make the varsity until his senior year there even though he ran 500-600 miles two straight summers. After college graduation he had assistant coaching stints at Buffalo and Sartell. Then he moved to Greenway-Nashwauk/Keewatin to take a teaching job. Here is his story:
"When I arrived at GNK, I was disappointed that cross country was only a club sport which was funded by a booster club. Participation was low. We had maybe five or six runners. Sue Holm oversaw the club and I asked her if I could help out and she agreed. Jeri Peterson has been a track & field coach at our school for many years as well and has done a lot of work. Our club grew at a steady rate over the next few years...10 the second year...maybe 15 or so the third year. We drove vans to meets to save money.
I started to think this had possibilities. It was tough but I went to the Superintendent and asked if we could make this thing school sponsored. This was not an easy thing to do as travel costs between all our towns seemed prohibitive. (Greenway is not a city, but it is a collaboration of little towns-Coleraine, Bovey, Taconite, Marble, Calumet, and Pengilly. Then of course we combine with the nearby cities of Nashwauk and Keewatin too.)
He was positive about it and agreed that if our numbers kept increasing, we would be able to have an actual team. But the first administrator helped us get it through after we waited a couple of years. In our third year we had close to 25 runners and then in the 4th year we had around 40. Since my 5th year we've had around 45 out. That year was the boy's team's first Iron Range Conference Championship. We are out to five straight titles since then. The girls have not won yet, but they are getting closer. Oh, yes, we do have separate cross-country uniforms now, and we take a yellow school bus to the meets.
I do ask students to come out for the team, but the athletes tend to be our best recruiters. Ellyssa Peterson was quite a pioneer for GNK as she qualified for the state meet 10 times and was All-State 7 times! She graduated in 2017 and now runs for the University of North Dakota.
Geno Uhrbom is from a football
family. He played the traditional
sports. But the kids got after him to go
out for cross country. It made sense to
Uhrbom to go out for track & field as well.
He is serious about it and wants to be good. If anything, I would like to see him take a
little time off and be a kid. We do have captains' practices
during the summer. They meet twice a
week. We hope they will run on their own
the other days."
Other good runners from the north are Cameron Stocke of Virginia and Luke Olson of Ely.
GNK BOYS
Geno Uhrbom 11th grade (5 state appearances) 2018 State Champion in Cross Country; 2019 State Champion in Track & Field in the 1600 and 3200 meter races.
Greg Peterson 12th grade (4 state appearance)
Spencer Engel 11th grade (3 state appearance)
Daniel Olson 10th grade (3 state appearance)
Connor Thoennes 10th grade (2 state appearance)
Michael Butterfield 11th grade (2 state appearance)
Weston Marx 11th grade (2 state appearance)
Levi Danielson 8th grade
Caden Westphal 11th grade
Baylie Norris 11th grade
Kaitlin Olson 8th grade
Carlee Plackner 12th grade (1 state appearance)
Karly Mann 8th grade
Avalynn Westphal 8th grade
Brooke Petrich 10th grade