Weber State Freshman Year - Part 2

Stef and I met on the cross country teams at Weber State my freshman year. It happened to be her sophomore year, and I felt like hot stuff when I started dating an older woman. Here are some pictures of us with our teams from that year. I have a lot of pictures of Stef from cross country, so I will start with those. Most of my pictures came from indoor and outdoor track.

Coach Blaisdell and the 95 Weber State Women's Cross Country Team - (standing) Cheri, Holly, Summer, Emilee, Nikki (kneeling) Stef, Jenny, Kathy, Heidi, Julie, and Molly.

Stef and the team at Pre-Nationals in Ames, Iowa.

Stef at the home meet - she ran 18:23 for 5k.

Stef warming up for the district championships - 18:07 for 5k

Stef with her family. I can't believe how young all of her brothers and sisters look. I like Brooke's shoes, and Amanda's pants, and Kyle's haircut, and Preston's sandals.

Stefanie, Summer, and Heidi at the Weber indoor meet.
This is from a 3000m race in Pocatello. It was a breakthrough race for me. I finished 3rd behind 2 BYU all-americans. The Weber guys you can see in the picture are Bob Evans, Warren Jones, Joe Wilson, and Robby Duncan. I've always loved the ISU track.

This is one of my favorites from that year - We found these 4 random toilets outside the minidome in Pocatello. It was perfect for Scott Thredgold, Joe, Andrea, and me.

This picture of Scott, Jeremy, Joe, and me was taken after Joe's baptism - I think.

I have always liked this shot at the starting line of the conference 3000m in Bozeman, MT. They crowded 24 of us onto the 4 laned track. It ended up being a really competitive field.

These 2 shots are of Stef with her goofy friends - Andrea, Emilee, Jenny, and Summer.

The first steeple I ever competed in. It was at Long Beach State University. This also marks the beginning of the original Weber 'Rat Pack' of Joe, Jeremy, and me. We finished within seconds of each other throughout this season.

The rat pack with Nate Kennedy after the Long Beach steeple. I think Nate qualified for nationals in that race. The rest of us ran around 9:20.

One of my favorite memories from college track was taking water jumps at Long Beach, Stanford, and Oregon the day before we would race. At Weber we had the reputation of being the best steeple chasers, and we usually had 5 or 6 guys running the steeple, so we knew we were studs when people would stop to watch us practice the water jumps. This picture has Robby, Jeremy, Joe, me, and Harmer (missing our 2 best steeplers from that year - Bob Evans and Nate Kennedy) You can't really see it here, but Long Beach would always put gold fish in the water jump.

This was taken at the hotel pool after the steeplechase at Stanford. Bob and I had also run the 10,000 meters the night before. We both ran prs - Bob's was good enough to break the school record and to lap me with a mile to go.

These pictures were both taken at Boise State. I think we raced there twice that season - neither time was very memorable for me. In the picture below, those fellas behind Stefanie are checking her out.

Stef says she is the one who took this picture. It is at Hayward Field in Eugene, OR - my first trip there. This was one of those days before the race when we looked like studs practicing our water jumps. The next day in the race I ran a season best 9:05, and this track became my favorite all-time track. Everytime I raced there in college I ran a pr for the steeple. In this picture - (standing) Donovan Bergstrom, Bob Evans, Warren Jones, Matt Harmer, Lee Lorenz, Rob Christensen, Coach Hislop (kneeling) Robby Duncan, me, Jeremy Tolman, Joe Wilson, and Nate Kennedy.

This was on the water jump at the Utah Collegiate Championships at East High (U of U's track). I thought I had the race won, but Ted Hanson (SUU) came back to beat me in the final lap.

Not a very fun 5000m at Utah State.

This was from the 10,000m at the Big Sky Conference Championships in Tempe, AZ. We raced at midnight, and it was still 95 degrees. I think that is Jeremy in the race with me. He paced me through the first 5k or so. It wasn't the last time Jer paced me to a good race. I finished 6th here.

This was after my last race as a freshman. Jeremy and I ran at the Junior Nationals in the Steeplechase. We were picked to go 1-2 (I had the fastest time of the year for 19 and under). Jeremy finished 1st and earned a trip to Sydney, Australia with the US junior team. I finished 4th and was left home to get ready for my mission. It was a breakthrough race for Jeremy who went on to finish 2nd at NCAAs as a Junior.

This was taken in Strong's Canyon at the end of that year. I think I am the one who took the picture. Stefanie and her roommates - Haley, Darcy, Emilee, Jessica, Jenny, and Andrea.