3 champions, 1 family

Newcastle High School’s athletic legacy includes a three-generation line of running champions, thanks to the exploits of Andrea (Bartsch) Thorson, her daughter Val (Thorson) Wilmoth, and her granddaughter, Brynn Abigail “Abbie” Wilmoth.

While a Dogie, Andrea Thorson started the tradition by claiming state championships in the mile and the half-mile races in 1975 and 1976, and said she was the first state champion from NHS for track. Andrea said that when she was a child, nobody else wanted to run the mile, so it wasn’t something the other girls had trained for, considering it was the early days after the passage of Title IX.

“I could do it, and then I ended up being good at it,” she said.

Andrea played many sports at NHS, and earned a scholarship to play basketball for Eastern Wyoming College. Val also played basketball until she was a sophomore at NHS, but then focused on her strength, and only ran indoor and outdoor track and cross-country for her final two years of high school.

Val graduated in 2000 from NHS after becoming a six-time state champion. She won state cross-country in 1998, and in track, she won the 800-meter and 3,200-meter records in 1999 and the 800-meter, 1,600-meter and 3,200-meter records in 2000. She said she truly enjoyed running in high school, especially because she was running with her friends and talking “all the time” along the routes.

“The races were obviously a huge part of it, but day-in, day-out, you’re running with your best friends,” she said.

Val said she had a good relationship with Pat Hayman, her coach at NHS, and she was best friends with his daughter. Val said that without the lessons that Hayman taught her, such as how to be a better competitor and a better person, she wouldn’t be where she is today. She doubts she would have been able to run for Columbia University, a Division I school and an Ivy League member, otherwise. Her state-level victories helped her secure scholarships to attend the school, which is in New York City.

And now it appears the family may have another track star in its midst. Andrea said Abbie, who is in eighth grade, earned first place in districts in cross-country and first in the 1,600 meter race in track this year at her school in St. Louis, where Andrea lives across the street from the Wilmoths.

She’s a natural, according to Andrea, but Val said that Abbie has been putting in the work too. She had occasionally run with her mother and more recently began running more seriously by participating in a running club track team. In fall 2024, she decided to start running cross-country for her school, which hadn’t consistently offered cross-country or track. On the second day on the team, in the first race she ran for the team, she placed second.

Val revealed that running came easier to her, and that she believes Abbie is the fastest distance runner in Saint Louis Public Schools District.

Val said she and Abbie still run together, though Abbie is in better shape because Val has been so busy with work that she hasn’t been able to run much in the last year. Val said that Abbie and her son, Parker, always out-sprint her during the last 100 meters when they run for fun, and the children tease her as they beat her to the finish line. 

Val said that this isn’t an anomaly – she, Andrea and Abbie are very competitive when it comes to grades and playing games, and Andrea agreed. Val said that Abbie ran so hard to try to beat her mom in a road race, which she barely trained for, that she threw up in her mouth. They have photos of the incident.

“It was a big moment of pride because she gave everything she had,” Val said with a laugh.

Still, Abbie said she doesn’t feel pressure from having a mother and grandmother who both placed at the state level because, like her mother, she enjoys running with her friends.

“It’s kind of fun to watch her do the same thing and develop those relationships,” Val said.

Andrea also enjoys being a spectator, and explained that when she was 32, she broke the left sacroiliac joint in her back, so she can’t run like she used to. She said she was working at a hospital in dietary and someone had mopped the floor and failed to put out a wet floor sign. She slipped and heard a snap and learned that she had broken the joint. She has had five surgeries to try to fix it. Ten days after her last back surgery, while her cousin was driving her to Denver for a check-up appointment, their vehicle was hit by a garbage truck, and she broke her neck. She was on pain pills for 26 years and has been off of them for the past nine years.

Even so, Andrea said she has a very blessed life, and she’s thrilled by watching her family run.

”It just brings back memories from me running when I was younger and then watching Val when she was in high school and, now, watching my granddaughter run, is just, it’s breathtaking,” she said. “It is the best experience to be able to see the third generation through.”

It’s been 49 years since she graduated from NHS, and Andrea said she’s coming to town for the Newcastle All School reunion. She comes back every year to her hometown, where she lived most of her life and where some of her family still lives.