Minnesota State Track and Field Meet Championship Preview


From left to right: Hudson Artz, Peyton Gunnarson, Kyler Bade, and Jarod White

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Class A Boys


Sprints

100m Top Seeds: Max Reis (Spectrum) - 11.01, Sanjay Redd (Minnehaha Academy) - 11.09, Sam Backer (Chatfield) - 11.10
100m Fastest Season Bests: Reis - 10.86, Hudson Artz (Fairmont) - 10.8h, Redd - 11.05
100m Returners: Noah Kiel (Crookston)
The Skinny: In a field consisting of just two seniors (including the only returning athlete from 2019 in Noah Kiel), there is one name that stands out who has been on top of the leaderboard in the Class A 100m all season, and that is Max Reis. The only runner in the field to have gone sub-11 and with the top six Class A times, he's a solid favorite, but won't be without competition. Sanjay Redd, with his racing history dating back to when he was 8, could make things interesting, as could sophomore Sam Backer and Hudon Artz (a qualifier in all three sprint events). Keep an eye out too for Jarod White. 100m may not be his strongest event, but that's not the fault of his speed.

200m Top Seeds: Kyler Bade (Plainview-Elgin-Millville) - 22.42, Jarod White (Pine Island) - 22.43, Noah Kiel (Crookston) - 22.50
200m Fastest Season Bests: Bade - 22.42, White - 22.43, Kiel - 22.50
200m Returners: Kiel
The Skinny: Noah Kiel is again the only returning 2019 qualifier in the field, and this time he finds himself as one of the top seeds too with his section time of 22.50. It's a pretty open and tight field that any number of athletes could take the win (including both Bade and White, though the 200m is not the best event for either). Backer, Redd, Artz, and Reis (who will be in the first heat) all will be doubling up with the 100m, while 400m specialist AJ Josephson and 8th grader Ayo Ogundeji could find themselves in the mix if they have good days.

400m Top Seeds: Joshua Finseth (Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton) - 49.84, AJ Josephson (Canby/Minneota) - 49.87, Jory Vosek (Fisher/Sacred Heart/Climax) - 49.95
400m Fastest Season Bests: Finseth - 49.84, Josephson - 49.87, Bade - 49.90
400m Returners: Bade (2019 400m Champion), Finseth (2019 400m 5th Place)
The Skinny: He may be running out of lane 8, but the fact remains that Kyler Bade is still the defending Class A champion and one of just four Class A runners to break the 50-second barrier this season, so all eyes will deservedly be on him. That said, this is truly anyone's race, with the top six season bests all within half a second of one another. With the lack of a clear frontrunner, it would hardly be surprising for any runner in the second heat to take the win. Even in the first heat, Annandale's Max Schimelpfenig has carved his way to an undefeated season with remarkable consistency and can't be counted out. This might be the most exciting competition of all the Class A sprint events.

Hurdles

110H Top Seeds: Jayson Ekiyor (Providence Academy) - 14.62, Kenny Soderberg (Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta) - 15.45, Simon Morgan (Mankato Loyola/Cleveland)/Jack Klug (Maple Lake) - 15.61
110H Fastest Season Bests: Ekiyor - 14.62, Soderberg - 15.45, Morgan - 15.54
110H Returners: Ekiyor (2019 110H Champion)
The Skinny: With all due respect to the rest of the field, this race is Jayson Ekiyor's to lose. The defending Class A Champion is hands-down the cream of the crop in the Class A high hurdles this year, as only his worst time of the season (among those listed in our database) is slower than the fastest time of any of his competitors. As long as Ekiyor runs a clean race and no one like Kenny Soderberg, Simon Morgan or Jack Klug (or anyone else) runs the race of their life, he should breeze to another State title.

300H Top Seeds: Kenny Soderberg (Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta) - 40.40, Ekiyor - 40.43, JT Rein (Lanesboro/Fillmore Central/Mabel-Canton) - 40.67300H
Fastest Season Bests:
 Soderberg - 39.41, Ekiyor - 40.43, Rein - 40.56
300H Returners: Gavin Skelton (Mesabi East) (2019 4th Place), Ekiyor
The Skinny: While Soderberg hasn't necessarily separates himself from the 300H field they way that Ekiyor has in the 100H, it's hard to ignore that gap of over a second between him and the second-best time in Class A coming into the meet. But don't let that gap fool you, this race has a very good chance of finishing very differently from the way it is seeded. At least five racers come into this competition undefeated (according to our database) and having rarely faced serious competition, including 2018 and 2019 finalist Gavin Skelton, and Owen Petersohn would also be part of that list except he was nipped twice by JT Rein at both Sub-Sections and Sections. This could be the day's wildest and most surprising race.

Distance

800m Top Seeds: Cameron Stocke (Rock Ridge) - 1:55.38, Emmett Gerres (Belle Plaine) - 1:57.98, Tyler Smith (Norwood-Young America) - 1:58.29
800m Fastest Season Bests: Stocke - 1:55.38, Jacob McCleary (Perham) - 1:55.56,  Gerres - 1:57.98
800m Returners: Stocke (2019 9th Place), McCleary (2019 10th Place), Mason Clark (Redwood Valley)
The Skinny: Cameron Stocke and Jacob McCleary enter the Class A competition with tremendous momentum. Both returning 800m finalists from 2019 are undefeated in 2021 in the event and own the two top times in the class by 2 seconds, and they both comfortably cruised through their respective Section competitions (and in Stocke's case, set a Section record in the process). Second-seeded Emmett Gerres could definitely be in the mix, as well as Joe Kozlowski (the brother of 2017 Class A 800m champion Carl), and several athletes will be running on fresh legs like Tyler Smith, Isaac Swanson, or the impressive freshman Jayce Kiehne, but with their recent momentum and their long track record of success, it's hard to see an athlete other than Stocke and McCleary taking home the title.

1600m Top Seeds: Cameron Stocke (Rock Ridge) - 4:17.56, Shef West (The Blake School) - 4:19.48, Alden Keller (Breck School) - 4:20.52
1600m Fastest Season Bests: Stocke - 4:17.56, Geno Uhrbom (Greenway/Nashwauk-Keewatin) - 4:17.78, West - 4:19.48
1600m Returners: Geno Uhrbom (2019 Champion), Stocke (2019 3rd place),  West (2019 12th Place)
The Skinny: Geno Uhrbom first qualified for State in the 1600m as a seventh-grader in 2016, where he finished 14th, and he has proceeded to qualify for every State competition since, including taking the 2019 championship. However, he has yet to beat Stocke head-to-head in 2021, coming closest at the Iron Range Championship where he was nicked at the line with the Class A's second-fastest time of the season. But while the two Northern Minnesota stars have had some great battles, the Twin Cities duo of Shef West and Alden Keller have pushed one another on just as fiercely, with their battle at Section 4A producing the 3rd- and 4th-fastest times in Class A. Another great duo who will be in the mix at the top is the Section 6A pair of Jacob McCleary and Emmet Anderson (the latter of which has never before run at State in the 1600m despite being All-State in the 2019 3200m and coming off two outstanding XC seasons), and it would be wrong to count out the undefeated Emmett Gerres and Tyson Mahar.

3200m Top Seeds: Shef West (The Blake School) - 9:36.74, Alden Keller (Breck School) - 9:38.36, Finn McCormick (Nova Classical Academy) - 9:42.12
3200m Fastest Season Bests: West - 9:36.74, Keller - 9:38.20, McCormick - 9:42.12
3200m Returners: Geno Uhrbom (2019 Champion), Emmet Anderson (2019 3rd Place), Tyson Mahar (2019 4th place)
The Skinny:  Geno Uhrbom's impressive 2019 victory in the 3200m saw him pull away halfway through the race and leave nothing to doubt. This year won't be nearly as easy, however. Between Emmet Anderson's dominance last cross country season and in the 3200m this spring, the 4A trio of West, Keller, and McCormick who all managed to qualify for State by standard (a rare accomplishment), and the unpredictability inherent in the long and taxing race, Uhrbom will have to prove he's up to the challenge to defend his title.

Relays

4x100m Top Seeds: Saint Charles - 43.84, Hills-Beaver Creek - 44.21, Lake City/Mora - 44.29
4x100m Fastest Season Bests: Saint Charles - 43.84, Hills-Beaver Creek - 44.21, Lake City/Mora - 44.29
The Skinny: With the 2019 champion (and Class A record-holder) Jordan having moved up to Class AA, the 4x100m field is wide open. None of the top three seeds were qualifiers in the event in 2019, and the top returning team (Mora) will have a complete turnover with all four members of their 7th-place 2019 squad having graduated. The lone seed under 44 seconds is the team from Saint Charles consisting of
Jett ThoresonNoah Disbrow, and brothers Cole and Luke Berends. Their gap of nearly half a second of second-seeded Hills-Beaver Creak is considerable (especially looking at how close the times are for the next six fastest seeds), but it's not something that can't be made up with well-executed handoffs. Even so, if Saint Charles can run a clean race, they'll be tough to beat.

4x200m Top Seeds: Saint Charles - 1:30.87, Annandale - 1:31.11, Plainview-Elgin-Millville - 1:31.47
4x200m Fastest Season Bests: Saint Charles - 1:30.87, Mora - 1:31.10, Annandale - 1:31.11
The Skinny: The same four runners make up the top-seeded Saint Charles 4x200 as their top-seeded 4x100, but their seed advantage over second-seeded Annandale is considerably slimmer, and it grows even slimmer once you consider Mora's season-best time of 1:31.10, and the fact that PEM's anchor of their 4x200 is Kyler Bade, this year's top seed in the 200m dash. This could be a very tight race.

4x400m Top Seeds: Pine Island - 3:26.42, Lake City - 3:27.00, Annandale - 3:28.49
4x400m Fastest Season Bests: Pine Island - 3:26.42, Lake City - 3:27.00, Annandale - 3:28.49
The Skinny: A quick glance at the runners consisting of Pine Island's and Lake City's 4x400 relays tell enough of a story to determine that one of those two section rivals will likely come away with the win here. Pine Island's team includes not only the versatile star vaulter Jarod White, but also individual 400m qualifier Mark Quintero and the Section 1A 3rd-place finisher Zackary Ihde. Meanwhile, Lake City's team includes 800m qualifier Joe Kozlowski, 3200m qualifier Reese Anderson, one of the long jump favorites in Matt Demars, and the multi-talented Kris Ryan (who also joins Kozlowski and Anderson on Lake City's 4x800m team). Annandale's lineup isn't quite as formidable as their competitors on paper (though it does include 400m qualifier Maxwell Schimelpfenig), but on a good day from each of their runners, they can definitely find themselves in the mix.

4x800m Top Seeds: Park Rapids - 8:15.67, Saint Cloud Cathedral - 8:19.13, Nova Classical Academy - 8:20.31
4x800m Fastest Season Bests: Park Rapids - 8:15.67, Saint Cloud Cathedral - 8:19.13, Nova Classical Academy - 8:20.31
The Skinny: Park Rapids is not your typical top seed for an event like the 4x800. For all four runners, this will be their only race of the competition, and only anchor Lane Monaghan has run an open 800m in under 2:06 according to the Milesplit database. But one of the great things about relays is that you can often create a collective that is greater than the sum of its parts, and Park Rapids has clearly done so in being a Championship contender. Even so, they'll have their work cut out for them in attempting to fend off teams like the defending champion Nova Classical Academy (who return Theo Andre from their Championship team and also features one of the top 3200m seeds in Finn McCormick) and other recent distance powerhouses like St. Cloud Cathedral, Saint James, Lac Qui Parle Valley/Dawson-Boyd and Greenway/Nashwauk-Keewatin (running in section 1). In fact, with just 8 seconds separating seeds 2-11, this could be anyone's race, and it may not even be a surprise if a school from section 1 like GNK, Lake City, or Albany took the title.

Jumps

Long Jump Top Seeds: Micah Schaap (Southwest Minnesota Christian/Edgerton) - 22'4.75", Kobe Swanson (Mora) - 21'11.25", Finseth - 21'9"
Long Jump Longest Season Bests: Anthony Marsh (Sauk Centre) - 22'7", Schaap - 22'4.75", Quintin Laveau (Pillager) - 22-0.25"
Long Jump Returners: Swanson (2019 8th place), Finseth
The Skinny:  Micah Schaap, Anthony Marsh, and Kobe Swanson have racked up 5 separate instances each of jumping at least 21 feet in the Milesplit database, a consistency that far outpaces every other jumper in the field. Marsh is the owner of the best jump of the season with 22'7" and has the benefit of not needing to compete in three other events like Schaap (who's also triple jumping and running the 400m and 4x400) or Swanson (who's running the 200m and is part of Mora's 4x100 and 4x200 teams). Joshua Finseth is also competing in a plethora of other events, but if his outstanding section performances are any indication, the returning 2019 qualifier is certainly peaking at the right time. And while Quintin Laveau just snuck into the meet with a jump barely over 20 feet, the fact that he's cleared 22 feet before make him a dangerous dark horse candidate.

Triple Jump Top Seeds: Finseth - 45'3", Reis - 44'5", Schaap - 43'8"
Triple Jump Longest Season Bests: Finseth - 45'3", Connor Johnsrud (Minnewaska) - 45'0.5", Reis - 44'5"
Triple Jump Returners: Schaap (2019 5th Place), C. Johnsrud (2019 6th Place)
The Skinny: Finseth improved his lifetime best in the triple jump by over 2 feet at sections to come away with the meet's top overall seed of 45'3", and his consistent improvement over the course of the season certainly seems to indicate that jump is no fluke. Even so, he'll have his hands full trying to keep ahead of both returning 2019 podium finishers in Schaap and Connor Johnsrud, as well as the sprinting star Max Reis (who had a similar leap at Sections that improved his lifetime best nearly 2 feet as well).

High Jump Top Seeds: Josh Creer-Oberstar (Rock Ridge) - 6'4", Peyton Johnsrud (Minnewaska) - 6'3", Andrew Siegle (Belle Plaine) 6'2"
High Jump Highest Season Bests: P. Johnsrud - 6'9", Creer-Oberstar 6'5", Henry Skinner (Rockford) - 6'4"
High Jump Returners: P. Johnsrud (2019 2nd Place), Creer-Oberstar (2019 7th Place), 
The Skinny: It took a Class A record to beat Peyton Johnsrud in the high jump two years ago, and this year he comes in as the owner of the best high jump mark in the state regardless of class. Both he and Josh Creer-Oberstar (the only athletes who return from the 2019 championship) are undefeated this year and each have yet to fail to clear at least 6-2, setting up this event to be a clear two-man show. But as with any event with high volatility, a false move from either athlete or an outstanding day from anyone else can definitely open the door for another athlete to sneak in for the upset.

Pole Vault Top Seeds: White - 16'0", Parker Helmbrecht (Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted)/Brian Schloeder (Rockford)/Jett Thoreson (Saint Charles) - 13'7"
Pole Vault Highest Season Bests: White - 16'0", Levi Richter (Perham) - 13'10", Zach McGlynn (West Marshall [Stephen-Argyle/Warren-Alvarado-Oslo]) - 13'9"
Pole Vault Returners: White (2019 5th Place), Austin Frank (BOLD/Buffalo Lake-Hector-Stewart), Thoreson, Jackson Thompson (Moose Lake/Willow River)
The Skinny: This competition of Jarod White's to lose. Full stop. Just a junior and already on the cusp of breaking the all-time state record and with more than two feet separating his best vault from anyone else in the competition, White would need to make a serious mistake in order not to come away as this year's champion. Of course, such mistakes can happen. Both the current boys and girls record holders Calvin Ciganik and Julia Fixsen failed to even qualify for State their respective senior years after no-heighting at Sections, and if something unfortunate as that were to happen, the door could be open for a tight battle between any number of athletes. But as long as White makes no such critical errors, he should safely take home the title.

Throws

Shot Put Top Seeds: Leo Silha (Plainview-Elgin-Millville) - 57'10", Tony Nelson (Tracy-Milroy-Balaton) - 54-11", Riley Paul (Grand Meadow/Leroy-Ostrander/Kingsland/Southland) - 51'10.5"
Shot Put Longest Season Bests: Silha - 57'10", Nelson - 54'11", Gage Stankiewicz (Esko) - 53'10.5"
Shot Put Returners: Silha
The Skinny: Leo Silha owns four competitions in 2021 where he threw over 55 feet, a mark that as of yet, no other Class A competitor has been able to accomplish. And as the only returning athlete from the 2019 championships, Silha is clearly the athlete to watch in this competition. That said, junior Tony Nelson has seen himself come into his own this year and is coming off back-to-back meets of throwing exactly 54-11. He could be primed for a big breakout and make himself a serious challenger for Silha.

Discus Top Seeds: Silha - 181'4", Ethan Fischer (Maple River) - 179'8", Stankiewicz - 166'4"
Discus Jump Longest Season Bests: Silha - 181'9", Ethan Fischer (Maple River) - 179'8", Stankiewicz - 178'4"
Discus Jump Returners: Fischer (2019 2nd Place), Trevor Christensen (East Central) (2019 8th Place), Stankiewicz
The Skinny: While Silha has established himself as a solid favorite in the shot put, it may be more difficult to maintain his standing as the top seed in the discus. Granted, Silha is the only athlete to clear 180 feet this season (and has done so twice), but sitting right on his heels at 179 feet is the 2nd place finisher from 2019 in Ethan Fisher (who was just a freshman at the time). Fisher opened some eyes in the season's opening week when he tossed a huge lifetime-best of 174-8, and has followed through on that early promise to remain undefeated in 2021. So too has fellow 2019 returner, Gage Stankiewicz, who is also undefeated and is also on the heels of Silha and Fisher with his season-best toss.

Wheelchair

100m: It probably isn't a stretch to say that, with four athletes seeded under 20 seconds, and three under 18, this race is going the be the greatest wheelchair competition since the addition of adaptive events at the MSHSL Championships back in 2011. In fact, Peyton Gunnarson, his brother Tyler Gunnarson, Aidan Gravelle and Tyler Shepersky are the four fastest 100m wheelers in MSHSL history, and the elder Gunnarson (who is committed to the adaptive athletics program of the University of Arizona) owns the third-fastest time in the nation this year. It won't be an easy ride for Gunnerson to take his fifth consecutive MSHSL title in this event, but it'll be a quick one. River Valley brothers James Hagen and Toby Hagen will also be part of the field.

200m: Back in 2019, Gravelle just held off Peyton Gunnarson for an upset over the then-three-time defending champion. This year, the race should be even better with Tyler joining the fold. Once again, this matchup will be between the three fastest 200m wheelers in MSHSL history, with James and Toby Hagen rounding out the field.

800m: Peyton Gunnarson is the only athlete in the field for this competition, but that certainly doesn't mean he has nothing to race for. Already the state record holder in the event (a record which he broke at Sections and was previously held by current US Paralympic hopeful Mark Braun), the fastest high school time in the Milesplit database is 1:54.84, which is less than half a second from Gunnarson's current best.

1600: A duel between defending champion Gravelle and Tyler Shepersky, this could turn into a great race that may even challenge Braun's state record of 4:02.40. Neither athlete has faced head-to-head wheeler competition yet this year, so expect to see a solid time drop for both.

3200: Tyler Shepersky is the defending champion in the 3200m, but he's not the top seed coming in. At Sections, Tyler Gunnarson bested the state record that Shepersky set two years ago, so Shepersky will be making the attempt to claim that record back.

Shot Put: Competing in the shot put at State for the first time since he took 3rd place as a seventh-grader, Peyton Gunnarson is having his best season in the event this year, and is expected to take home his first championship in the event. James and Toby Hagen will also be competing in Category 2.

Discus: Aidan Gravelle enters with the top seen and having finished second in the competition in 2019 and having thrown at least 45 feet in every competition so far this year. Tyler Gunnarson comes in seeded second with a season-best of 37-7, and Toby Hagen will round out the field.