Grant Nelson positions himself in lane 6 on an indoor track in Rochester, N. Y., waiting for the pass in the final leg of the 4×400 meter relay. As teammate Victor Lelinga bolts down the final stretch of the 200 meter indoor track, Nelson knows he’ll have to make up ground in the final lap if the Bethel University men’s 4×400 relay team is going to beat the State University of New York at Cortland and capture the NCAA Division III Indoor title. For Nelson and the rest of the relay team, the pressure is immense but not unfamiliar.
Less than a year earlier, the men’s relay team competed in a similar spot at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in Myrtle Beach, S. C. The Royals held fifth place in the overall team standings, and the relay team needed a strong finish to secure a spot on the podium.
The four-man team consisted of then sophomore Grant Nelson, fifth-year Jacob Parent, and seniors Joel Smith and Josh Sampson. They took to the track and finished in 3:07.90, edging out the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse to claim the program’s first national title in any men’s event.
“We knew we could run fast at the start of the year,” Parent said. “We had the same group of guys the year before, and we placed fourth and sixth… and every single day that was our goal.”
After reaching the pinnacle of outdoor competition for the men’s relay, the Royals went from chasing the dream to having to defend it.
Not only were they the defending national champions of the teams they competed against, like La Crosse and Cortland, the Royals were also the only ones to return the majority of their relay team.
“We’ve always been a threat but never a top-three threat,” Nelson said. “We knew that this year we were the team with the target on our back.”
Even with the target on its back, the group remained confident heading into the fall as the runners began to prepare for the indoor season. The group looked for a replacement for Joel Smith, the only member of the team they lost. Josh Thomsen, a senior in his second season with the team, stepped in.
Thomsen decided to attend Hamline University and run track there. Even as a Piper, though, he had his eyes set on Bethel, even initially being recruited by head coach Andrew Rock out of high school.
However, Thomsen decided not to attend Bethel, initially feeling that he wasn’t good enough for the Bethel program.
“I knew Bethel was very good,” Thomsen said. “So I wanted to suck somewhere it wouldn’t matter.”
In two seasons at Hamline, Thomsen broke the school record in the 60-meter hurdles and nearly set records in the 110 and 400-meter hurdles.
Following his sophomore season, Thomsen decided to give Bethel a try after reconnecting with Rock and the Bethel track team at various meets.
Smith’s departure gave Thomsen a spot on the 4×400 during this season.
The team needed another replacement for Sampson who was unable to compete in the indoor season but is still eligiblefor the outdoor season. Victor Lelinga stepped in to compete on the relay team during the indoor season.
“We felt that even though they left, there was a good legacy left,” Nelson said. “And also great athletes to step into their places.”
The relay team credits this smooth transition to the team’s foundation, Rock.
Through a combination of culture-building and solid recruiting, Rock has put together a team that has experienced unprecedented success in recent years. The Royals have dominated the MIAC and competed with not only Division III schools but Division II opponents as well.
Parent recalls being an underclassman and being a part of a program Rock calls “track pals” where a freshman gets paired with an upperclassman to build bonds immediately and promote a God-centered environment.
The combination of team-building and aggressive recruiting results in a team that is strong across the board, particularly in the sprinting and field events.
“I think there’s something special about this era right now,” Nelson said. “[Rock] has done an incredible job of recruiting.”
Parent initially dreamed of playing college basketball after high school. He only participated in one full season of high school track and field, picking up the sport during his junior year.
“I was a really late bloomer in high school,” Parent said. “And turned out to be pretty good.”
So Parent asked the Bethel basketball coaching staff to forward his track times and information to the track and field staff. Rock ended up being the only track coach to pursue him. When Parent’s senior track season was canceled due to COVID-19, he decided to give both basketball and track a shot.
“I wasn’t a state runner, wasn’t anything spectacular,” Parent said. “Coach Rock was the only coach that really recruited me.”
The basketball-track dual-sport plan didn’t last long as Parent dropped the hardwood in favor of the rubber. Parent decided to keep running the event his high school coach threw him into during his lone season: the 400 meter dash.
Fighting with an already deep and established group of runners for the final relay spot, Parent managed to earn the final spot on the team his freshman year and never looked back.
By the time he was a senior, he even decided to come back for a fifth year after being a part of the national championship team.
“I’m just happy to be back and able to run one more year,” Parent said. “I figured, ‘why not?’”
That decision turned into an excellent indoor season where the Royals won their third consecutive MIAC indoor title as a team. They swept both the 4×200 and 4×400 sprint relays, earning a spot at the NCAA Division III National Championships.
The performance earned the Royals a slew of individual accolades, with Rock winning his fourth Indoor Coach of the Year award and Nelson taking home MIAC Athlete of the Year.
Now Nelson rounds the final stretch of the indoor track in Rochester, having closed in on the SUNY Cortland team, narrowing the 15-meter gap that greeted him at the beginning of the final leg.
But it wasn’t enough. The Red Dragons edged out the Royals by a mere .30 seconds. Bethel finished as the national runner-up.
For Nelson, this served as a reminder of what makes track and field unique.
“Track is very unique in that if you’ve run a good race, you can’t be mad at the end of the day,” Nelson said.
