Photo Credit: Texas MileSplit
5. The Lone Star Bandit Jumps Into A High School XC State Championship
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This was the wildest story of 2022.
Brenden Herbert, a former University of Texas runner who had clocked a sub-4 mile and had earned All-American recognition while with the Longhorns, for some reason entered the Texas high school cross country state championships in November and decided to rip it up with high school qualifiers in the UIL Class 6A race. It was reminiscent of the Manhattan Bandit, who entered, left and then reentered XC races in 2016.
Herbert entered the course -- after much speculation -- sometime after the gun went off, and then worked his way up to the front, slotting himself next to eventual champion Kevin Sanchez of Austin Vandegrift, who ran away from Herbert in the final 300 meters.
It was unbelievable.
And it surely took the thousand or so spectators that Saturday morning in Round Rock, Texas off guard, because his involvement in the race spurred a ton of conversation.
Just who exactly was the mystery runner who was in contention for a state title?
What Hebert should have realized was just how illogical the move was. No athlete in the highest classifications of Texas, in one of the biggest states of the U.S., just squirts his way into the front pack without so much as an ID.
Herbert was wearing an old bib and his Lake Travis alumnus jersey, his hair pulled back and the UT logo of the Longhorns showing faintly on his half tights.
He managed to finish the entire race and was second overall before the UIL quickly disqualified him.
Herbert managed to take a picture of Sanchez in the finishing chute and then was approached by MileSplit's Ashley Tysiac, who asked him, essentially, what the hell he was doing. His response?
"I just ran it for fun," he said. "I ran it, me and Kevin. I knew me and Kevin from high school."
His ruse found out, Herbert eventually took down all of his social media, made his Strava account private and probably regretted the decision entirely.
10 years from now, though? It certainly will make for a good story.
Remember that one time a 22-year-old ran in our high school state championships?
INDEX:
Natalie Cook's 5K - The All-Time 800 And 1,600m - Brenden Herbert's Madness - Newbury Park's Greatness - Team USA's World Haul - The 800 Meter Double - The Sub-4 Club