Poll: Minnesota Boys and Girls Runner of the Week


From left to right: Minnetonka girls XC, Sam Scott, Ali Weimer, and Isabelle Schmitz

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We have had some record-breaking and incredible performances this week, it was tough to choose just four boys and girls for the polls, but we had to anyways! We had big meets such as the Roy Griak, and Milaca Mega Meet where we had some remarkable performances!

This poll will be for performances from September 20th to September 26th. 

Each will there will be four boys and four girls for each poll. Participants are based on the MileSplit Minnesota staff's opinions. The rest is up to you!

Runner of the Week Winners:

WeekBoy WinnerGirl Winner
1Emmett GerresAli Weimer
2Lance NemecekMarissa Long
3Sam ScottAmanda Overgaauw



Sam Scott simply put together a historic week with a win at Roy Griak and a win at the Minneapolis Southwest Grasshopper invite. At the Griak he was able to beat out Micah Blomker and Nick Gilles to win by approximately 7 seconds with a time of 15:49.30. At the Grasshopper invite, he set a new personal best of 15:21.20 to win his then 4th race of the season. 

Noah Breker broke through in a big way at the Milaca Mega meet en route to a big 30-second personal best and a win over Gabriel Birkmeier and James Olson in the boys D1 race. Brekers previous PR was 16:10.80 from his first 5K this season, but her crushed that to a tune of a new personal best of 15:39.70. 

Shef West put in a huge performance in the boys D3 race at the Milaca Mega Meet and ran away with the win with a time of 16:03.60 to win by 50 seconds over East Grand Forks, Jonathan Krueger. This is his first Milaca win in four attempts at the race. 

The Roseville boys, led by James Olson, were able to squeak out a narrow win over some over their Class AAA rivals in the D1 race at the Milaca Mega Meet. They scored 121 points to win by 1 point over Hopkins, 3 points over Mounds View, and 13 points over Stillwater. This is their first team win of the season, and I would expect them to move up a bit when the next coaches' rankings are revealed. 



Abigail Tri in just her third cross country race showed that she might be a runner to watch out for, for a long time! She easily ran Minnesota best time for a seventh-grader when she ran a 19:29 at the Lake City Invite. This is the best time in the state for a seventh-grader by 45 seconds. It is already the 46th fastest time by a seventh-grader in state history. It is also the 5th best time nationally for a seventh-grader. 

Ali Weimer was able to drop Illinois's Ava Parekh after trailing her at the mile marker and 3000m marker to take a decisive victory at the Roy Griak to win the girls gold race with a time of 17:48.50! This is her third win of the season in three meets. She has averaged 17:48 per 5K this season. 

Isabelle Schmitz with a dominating performance was able to win the girl's D2 race at the Milaca Mega Meet, by running a time of 17:56.40 to set a new personal best and run under 18:00 for the first time since 2019. She beat second-place finisher, Hailee Zimpel, by over a minute. 

Minnetonka Girls won the Buffalo invite with a perfect 15 points. They put all seven of their varsity members in the top seven spots, with a 55 second split between those seven finishers, and a 45 second split for their scorers. If they had run at Roy Griak, their 19:30 average would've been the best average in the field just ahead of the Middleton girls.