Eagle Valley High School sends 5 athletes to Nike Outdoor Nationals

Five Eagle Valley track and field athletes competed at the Nike Outdoor National track and field championships last month. Tiago Horriutiner, Lillian Brueck, Allie Braun and Dylan and Tyler Blair all traveled to Eugene, Oregon for the event, held at Hayward Field from June 19-22.

“Just being in that stadium was a crazy feeling,” said Brueck.

“It was just an amazing experience walking onto that field knowing all the history,” Horritutiner added. “You can sense the aura when you step on the track.”

The competition ran concurrently with the USA Track and Field U20 Championships. Athletes were placed into either the “championship” or “emerging elite” categories based off of qualifying standards. Around 5,000 athletes from all 50 states — including five high school national record holders — competed at the event. Eagle Valley also qualified a boys championship sprint medley, 4×100, 4×200, 4×400 and distance medley relay squads but ultimately did not roster teams for those events.

“It was really awesome,” coach Charlie Janssen said. Since Janssen started at Eagle Valley in 2015, he has brought a team to at least one post-season regional or national cross-country championship event. This past winter, he coached Dylan Blair to Nike Indoor Nationals. But the last time the Devils sent an athlete to Nike Outdoor Nationals was in 2021, when Samantha Blair competed in the mile.

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Horriutiner was coming off a third-place finish at the 4A state track meet in May. The sophomore also excelled in both horizontal jumps and developed into a viable option on several of the stacked Devils’ sprint relay squads. Eagle Valley reset the 20-year-old 4×100-meter relay record and the 4×200-meter mark as well. In preparing for the Nike event, Horritutiner cleared 6-6 — two inches higher than his personal best — in practice.

“I just went in with a positive mindset and just saying, whatever happens, I don’t have anything to lose,” he said. “But with a lot of the heavy rains, I slipped out of a lot of my jumps. It wasn’t great conditions but it was a great competition.”  

Horriutiner cleared 6-02.25 to place 10th out of more than 50 athletes in the emerging elite division. Troy Sowards of La Jara, Colorado took the title with a jump of 6-06.25. The championship high jump was won by Texas star Etoro Bassey (7-04.25).

“I didn’t jump a personal best but it was an amazing experience and I’m just going to keep working all year round. You’re going to see better things from me next year.”

Brueck, one of the top point producers throughout the regular season, ran a personal best time of 45.89 in the 300-meter hurdle prelims at state this spring. Unfortunately, she injured a muscle in her hip during the race.

“So my training probably wasn’t how it should have been,” the rising senior said of her nationals build up. Even though she increased the intensity in the final weeks, the three-sport athlete didn’t quite feel like herself in the starting blocks.

“It was definitely just about taking in the experience,” she said. “I didn’t really have an expectation for it since it was my first time running (the event). The first 200 meters was like pure adrenaline.”

Brueck placed 43rd in the emerging elite 400-meter hurdles in a time of 1:07.83. Braun, who set the Devils high jump school record (5-5) in April, was not able to clear the opening height (5-1) in the girls championship division. Zoey Brinker won the title with a leap of 5-09.25.

The Blair twins were coming off a quick turnaround from their efforts at the International U18 Mountain Running Cup, held in central Slovakia on June 14. Dylan Blair won the 5.8-kilometer uphill trail race, which climbed over 500 meters. Janssen said his pupil “booked a one-way trip on the pain train” in running the championship 5,000 meters five days later — and a 3,000-meter run two days after that.

The rising senior blasted a 4:29 first mile in the first event.

“They went out at a pretty screaming pace,” Janssen said, adding that the pair had worked to ingrain 4:40 mile tempo in the weeks leading up to the event. Blair dropped a pair of 75-second laps in the middle of the 5K, but picked the pace back up to become the first Eagle Valley athlete to dip under the 15-minute threshold. Earlier in the fall, he’d set the program 5K mark in cross-country with a 15:04 at the Liberty Bell Invite.

“Running on a track and a cross-country course are a lot different,” stated Janssen, who believes Blair might have been close to 14:30 if not for the trail race and subsequent trans-Atlantic travel schedule prior to nationals. Blair followed up his 15th in the 5K with a 8:33.15 to place 29th in the 3K. Corbin Coombs won the titles for both events, running 14:04.49 and 8:03.68, respectively.

Tyler Blair dealt with a stress fracture during the back half of the season, an unfortunate interruption after running a sea-level program best in the 1,600-meters in April. Even though he couldn’t run in practice, he stayed in shape.

“He was so diligent. He really did cross train like an Olympian,” Janssen said. “Hours a day — in the pool, on the bike, elliptical a stair master — stuff like that.”

Despite qualifying for the 800 at state, Blair scratched two hours before the race because his injury wasn’t fully healed.

“That was really hard. I hope it’s something he never has to do again,” Janssen said before adding that his comeback to qualify and compete so well at Nike was a testament to his resiliency. “He has the ability to bounce back mentally pretty quick and just get ready to race with what he has to give on that day.”

Blair ran 1:56.13 in the 800 on Saturday and came back Sunday day to run 4:18 in the full mile (with a program best 4:16.61 1600-meter split en route) — with a 61-second bell lap.

Heading into 2025-26, the Blairs will take a break before ramping things up for cross-country in the fall. Horritutiner hopes to win state in the high jump — his primary event — and garner NCAA DI college coaches’ attention. Brueck plans to play softball and basketball, but is hoping to train for track a little in the winter, too. Ashley Rohweder’s 18-year-old 300-meter hurdle record (44.11) is one target.

“(Coach Jeff) Shroll thinks it’s doable, but it’s going to take a lot of work,” Brueck said. “I think this last season was just kind of a breakout season for me. I just have a lot of confidence going into next season. I’m really excited to see what happens.”