GRHS grad receives honors

A Green River High School graduate is making a name for himself on the collegiate level in cross country.

Braden Reichl, who is a sophomore at the D-2 school Michigan Tech University, was recognized for finishing higher than any other cross country runner in MTU history in the 8K at the GLIAC Conference, which took place Nov. 3. He finished in sixth place with a time of 25:09.7. He received the GLIAC First-Team All-Conference award.

Reichl's parents Dawn and Aaron Reichl were at the GLIAC meet.

"It was the coolest thing," Dawn said. "It was just awesome."

Braden said the coach was pretty excited about his finish.

"My goal was to just get a top 20. I was really surprised," Braden said. "I placed up with some people I thought were a lot faster than me."

This past weekend, Reichl competed in the Midwest Regional Championship cross country meet. He came in 11th place overall in the 10K with a time of 32:07 and received All-Regional honors. In an earlier interview, Braden said his goal was to get All-Regional honors and he's excited to obtain that goal.

On Monday, all three were waiting to hear on whether or not Braden had made it to nationals. Dawn said Braden wasn't an automatic qualifier so they had to wait and see if he would make it in on an at-large bid. Late Monday afternoon, he received the call that he would be going to nationals. A dream Braden wanted to happen, but didn't know if it would be this year.

Braden said he started his cross country career when he was a sophomore at GRHS.

"I was playing football and didn't want to do it anymore," Braden said.

Dawn suggested he try cross country, he said. Since Braden had been in long-distance running events in middle school track, he figured he'd give it a try.

"I really wasn't that into it until my senior year," Braden said.

Then, he started to excel at the sport and at the end of the year he was named both All State and All Conference. He said it was fun because he would run with this friends every day.

This is something that he continued to do in college. Braden said in college the workouts are more intense. They run more miles and lift weights even more.

"I'm still liking it a lot," he said.

When Braden isn't busy training, he's working on obtaining his bachelor's degree in chemical engineering.