NORTH MANKATO — Cooper Gudahl set a new personal record in the 5k at the Section 2AA championships on Thursday for Fairmont. The senior Cardinal beat his previous best time by 14 seconds to finish the meet in eighth place as an individual, extending his prep running career to the state championship meet.

“It was just overwhelming pride,” Gudahl said of his emotions when he crossed the finish line. “I’ve wanted it so bad for so long. This was just years of hard work, years of doing one of my favorite things with my favorite people. I can’t even put it into words.

“It took a solid three minutes for it to really set in. I started bawling my eyes out while I was hugging my coaches, my teammates and my mom. It’s a feeling I’ve never had before in my life.”

Photo by Jake McNeill: Fairmont sophomore Brooklyn Stone runs ahead of a pack at the Section 2AA girls cross country championships at Benson Park in North Manakto on Thursday.

Coming into Thursday’s race, Gudahl’s personal record was 17:06.1, set back on Sept. 12, 2024. After three straight meets finishing in the low 18-minute range, Gudahl put together season-best times three consecutive weeks. He ran a 17:35.4 in Oct. 7, a 17:09.4 at the Big South Conference Championships on Oct. 14 and smashed his PRs with a 16:52.8 on Thursday to earn his first state meet berth.

Gudahl was ranked 17th in the section heading into Thursday’s championship, so finishing eighth in the section championship is as much as any coach could ask of him, Fairmont head coach Andrew Moeller said. He added that he told Gudahl before the meet that he didn’t need to do anything crazy, just come ready to execute to the best of his ability, but Gudahl did something crazy anyway.

“Cooper’s a gamer. He’s somebody who always kind of steps up to the occasion,” Moeller said. “He made a comment a while ago saying it didn’t matter how big or small a meet was, he always kind of placed about the same, which was about right where he was here today with eighth, so he just steps up to the occasion. That’s not just in running, that’s everything he does, he always makes the best of it.”

Gudahl credited his coaches and family for being supportive and helping him get to the talent level he’s reached over his six years running cross country, as well as his teammates for making it all worthwhile.

“I wouldn’t trade any of [my teammates] for anybody. Every time I stepped on a course this year, it was always so much bigger than myself,” Gudahl said. “It was about making my team proud, making my coaches proud, and if you ask anybody, one thing about me is that I’ve got unwavering confidence. When I got on that line, I knew I was going to state. I wasn’t going to let anybody stop me, whether I had to go get first or eighth to go [to state].”

As a team, Fairmont boys placed seventh out of 11 qualifying teams in the section with 155 points. The Cardinals’ score sandwiched them between eighth-place Worthington’s 213 and sixth-place St. Peter’s 135.

Mankato East and Belle Plaine finished first and second at the meet with 49 and 71 points, respectively, to earn state qualifying bids.

On the girls side, Fairmont placed eighth out of nine qualifying teams with 213 teams to beat out Worthington’s 269 and finish one spot back of Hutchinson’s 198. St. Peter and Mankato earned the team state meet bids with 46 and 58 points, respectively.

Brooklyn Stone and Delaney Klug each set personal records for the Fairmont girls to place 33rd and 38th, respectively. Stone, a sophomore, clocked in at 21:21.0 to lower her PR by 96 seconds since the start of the season.

Klug is in her second season with the team as an eighth grader. Her time of 21:51.1 on Thursday brought her best time down by exactly a minute from her best time as a seventh grader.

“We had five girls at 23-flat or faster. If you had told me that at the beginning of the season, I don’t know if I would have quite believed you, because we didn’t have anybody faster than that [at the first meet],” Moeller said. “To improve the way that we have and finish out where just about everybody is running really big personal bests or season bests is huge.”

On the boys side, Devin Hanson was the Cardinals’ No. 2 runner with a time of 17:44.9. The time was good for a 24th-place finish in the meet and beat his previous personal record by six seconds.

Holden Junkermeier also set a personal-best as the boys’ No. 4 runner, placing 40th at 18:34.5 to give the freshman his first finish below 19 minutes.

Cole Hanson was the boys’ No. 3 runner in 32nd place, with a 18:03.5 time for the eighth grader, while Michael Hamlet rounded out the Fairmont scorers in 51st at 19:33.8.

The Fairmont girls got personal records from each of their five scorers in the meet. Sophomore Avery Steuber placed 45th at 22:26.8 while seventh grader Ellie Drever and eighth grader Amiyah Dunn placed 50th and 51st at 22:57.7 and 23:00.2.

Steuber, in her first season with the team, beat her PR that she set a week prior by a minute. Dreyer also set a new best time by about 80 seconds in her first varsity 5k while Dunn set a PR by 48 seconds in her second varsity 5k.

“The girls don’t slack off. They don’t skip runs, skip out on mileage or anything. They do what they’re asked to do and they trust the training, and I think that’s really shown,” Moeller said. “I’m really excited for their future. I think in the next couple of years here, we’re going to have a very, very solid girls program.”

Gudahl is the lone senior on this year’s Fairmont cross country team, and his season will be continuing now for another week. He’ll return to competition at the University of Minnesota’s Les Bolstad Golf Course for the Class AA state meet on Nov. 1 at 12:15 p.m. As he continues to train for his biggest race yet, Gudahl said that his teammates already told him they’d continue to train with him over the next week to help him stay motivated for the big race.

“I’ve got nothing to lose once I get to state, so you can expect me to do something pretty explosive,” Gudahl said.