June 15, 2021
Few athletes earn all-state honors in even one sport. But Nick Gardner ’14, among MPA’s most accomplished endurance athletes, was all-state in three sports, excelling in cross country running, Nordic skiing and track and field.
In cross country running, Gardner led MPA to a runner up finish at the 2013 MSHSL state meet, its highest ever finish. That year, he earned team MVP, Tri Metro all-conference honors, and all-state honors, one of just five MPA boys cross country runners to ever earn all-conference and all-state honors in the same season. His time of 16:48 in the 5K is tenth fastest all-time at MPA.
On the track, Gardner ran on MPA’s state champion 4x800m relay team in June 2014, earning all-state honors. Their time of 8:04.72 was the fastest class A time in 2014 and remains MPA’s school record. Gardner also ran as a part of the school record 4x1600m team at the 2014 Tri-Metro Conference relays meet and he is on MPA’s top ten all-time list individually in the 3200m.
Gardner enjoyed tremendous success across all three of his sports, but his main love has always been Nordic skiing, and Gardner represented the Panthers well. He won the Tri-Metro Conference and section 4A championships, multiple team MVP awards, and, of course, all-state honors. A three time state qualifier, Gardner finished as the runner up at the 2014 MSHSL Nordic skiing championships at Giants Ridge in Biwabik, MN.
Gardner’s Nordic skiing memories have stuck with him in the years after graduating from MPA. “I will never forget watching my best friend (and MPA teammate) Kristen Bourne win the section championship, and then racing for the chance to win my own section championship,” he says. “I was up against two competitors that had both finished in the top four the year before (I had gotten 12th), so I was the clear underdog, but I believed in myself. I saw that homestretch fast approaching and I said to myself “now or never.” I took the lead and crossed the finish line to more hugs than I think I have ever received. I still remember how Kristen and I were absolutely glowing because we were really good friends and we had both just won section championships!”
Gardner chose to continue his Nordic skiing career at Williams College in Williamstown, MA after visiting and feeling a connection with his future teammates. For the Ephs, Gardner recorded an Eastern Intercollegiate Ski Association (EISA) top ten finish once and top 20 finishes in five EISA races. In 2016, he was a member on Williams’ team that finished in ninth place at the NCAA Division I men’s Nordic ski championships (In Nordic skiing, Williams competes at the NCAA Division I level.) He was also the US Ski Association U20 national champion in the 10K classic ski event. He earned New England Nordic Ski Association (NENSA) skier of the week honors in November 2017, and served as the Ephs’ team captain as a senior. After graduating, with a degree in math and environmental justice, Gardner competed on NENSA’s development team, and in 2020, began work at Perennial Pantry, a startup working in sustainable agriculture.
Gardner stresses that he was not only prepared to succeed as a college athlete, he also felt academically ready. “MPA instilled in me a sense of balance that has become my mantra in high level competition. Instead of choosing between athletics and academics, I believe both can embolden the other. Instead of defining myself as an athlete or a math major or putting myself in any other box, I define myself as a whole person. And I have MPA to thank. Though I’ve been a math person since first grade, Ms. Buck, Ms. Conway, Ms. Kunze, and Ms. Sommer taught me that I could also be a ceramics person, a history person, a language person, and a literature person, too,” he says. “This too influenced my decision to go to Williams in a huge way. In touring other college ski programs, it often seemed that around their sophomore years, athletes needed to make the decision to focus on studies or sports, but at Williams, athletes didn’t “sacrifice” skiing for grades, or vice versa. They strove to be the best at both. This mentality has created one of the best teams in the nation and for me, the mentality is a direct result of my MPA education.”
