Bradley’s track team has had a very successful start to the season, and much of the credit goes to its freshman class.
We all know about Nicola Jensen, the superstar from South Africa, but her supporting teammates are incredibly impressive as well. There are 14 true freshmen on the team, and that’s not counting all of the redshirts from the COVID-19 season. With a young group, it would be an understatement to say the future of this team is bright.
Some of the team members have traveled over 1,000 miles to the Hilltop to compete for the Braves. Contrast that with Eli Rieker, the lone freshman who hails from Peoria.
“I grew up being a fan of Bradley, specifically their basketball team,” Rieker said. “It’s just fun to have my parents come to my meets and have them watch me play for the college we grew up in the same city of.”
The blending of cultures is something that Bradley encourages. It’s hard for a freshman to acclimate to the college lifestyle, but for some moving overseas, it’s even harder.
“My intent was to create a melting pot here at Bradley with the track and field/cross country program,” associate coach Fabia McDonald said. “We can recruit internationally … [and] locally, and let the culture speak for itself, let the athletes engulf into one another, learn from one another and create a culture that’s unbeatable at any point.”
Community is a value that has defined the team, as the members are close both on and off the track.
“We are all super close because we are the new kids and it is hard being away from home,” freshman Amiyah Davis said. “I think we all connected on that because most of us, except Eli, are from out of state, so we bonded with being away from home.”
Davis recently broke the women’s record for the 400-meter run, along with many other records that the team continues to shatter. Their careers are just beginning, but they are already racing to beat themselves.
“I actually didn’t know I broke [the women’s 400-meter record] until coach McDonald told me, so I was shocked,” Davis said. “I was very excited that I broke it very early in the indoor season.”
While breaking records, some of which have been around for decades, can put pressure on you, this freshman class embraces the challenge.
“When you are beating yourself every day, when you are trying to continue to move forward, the ceiling tends to disappear,” McDonald said. “When they return next year seeing their opportunities are endless, they’ll be able to have a different kind of fight, and we are excited to see it.”
The freshman class is stacked with talent, whether it be Shae Fuller, who holds the school triple jump record, or Maya Hendersen, who holds the 600-yard event record. Three more years with this class is going to be fun for the Braves, but scary for the Missouri Valley Conference.
“The potential has skyrocketed at this time,” McDonald said. “We have a core group of hard working freshmen … whereas they’re coming into year two, they are going to come in with no ceiling. They are going to be able to shoot past expectations they have ever set for themselves because they had already done that year one.”
It is hard to look ahead to the future when the present is going so well, but when that day comes, these freshmen will be ready to go.
