10.30.06
Billy Nelson
Billy NelsonOriginally uploaded by andynoise.
Billy Nelson
Height: 5-6
Senior
Experience: 3 Letters
Previous Affiliations
Taft Union
Bakersfield, Calif.
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Courtesy: CUBuffs.com
Release: 09/22/2003
COLLEGE–2005: Nelson returned to action with an eighth-place finish (fourth for CU) at the Rocky Mountain Shootout. He improved to a sixth-place finish for the Buffs at Pre-Nationals (second for CU). Nelson moved back to CU’s fourth racer in the Big 12 Championships and finished ninth overall. He returned to his stellar form at the NCAA Mountain Regions where he bested All-American teammate Bret Schoolmeester by five-tenths of a second for the top honors in 30:28.2. Nelson finished his season as the fourth Buff to cross the line at the NCAA Championships. 2004: Redshirt. Did not compete. 2003: Nelson won his first collegiate contest when he took CU’s own Rocky Mountain Shootout in a Buffalo Ranch course pr 25:05 (18th all-time fastest 8k time). With Dathan Ritzenhein returning to the lineup at Pre-Nationals, Nelson would score as CU’s No. 2 runner the remainder of the season. He was the top sophomore at the Big 12 Championships when he finished third overall, and second to Ritzenhein on the CU ladder, when he covered the 8k Barton Creek Lakeside Golf Course in 24:34. After finishing 20th in the national qualifying as a freshman, he finished third, behind Ritz and BYU’s Kip Kangogo and earned his second All-American title with a career-best 16th place finish (just 39 ticks off the winning pace). 2002: Nelson was Wetmore’s “Diamond In The Rough” as a freshman. The Big 12 Newcomer of the Year, and CU’s No. 4 runner, had a pair of top-10 finishes at the Rocky Mountain Shootout and Big 12 Championships and finished 25th (top 10 percent) at the Pre-Nationals. As the top finishing freshman at the conference championships, he finished just one second behind CU senior All-American Steve Slattery, but turned around two weeks later to edge Slattery by two seconds to finish 20th (as the race’s top freshman) at regionals. He capped off his freshman campaign with a 42nd place finish at the NCAA Championships to earn All-American accolades. He went on to win the junior men’s 8k race at the U.S. Cross Country Championships in Houston before an American-best 26th-place finish at the World Championships in Lusianne, Switzerland. HIGH SCHOOL: Taft was the South Sequoia League cross country champions his sophomore through senior seasons. Nelson was an All-South Sequoia League performer his freshman through senior seasons and an All-Area pick his sophomore through senior year. His prep career culminated in his winning the Division 4 California State Championship as a senior. His senior year he finished third at the FootLocker Regional meet before a ninth-place finish at Nationals. Following the prep season he finished third, and earned a bid on the national team, at the U.S. Winter World Cross Country Championships decided in Vancouver, Wash. That March he finished 33rd (the second American) in the 8k men’s junior race at the World Championships in Dublin, Ireland. IN THE CLASSROOM: Nelson is a history major at Colorado and earned a spot on the Commissioner’s Honor Roll during the spring of ‘06. PERSONAL: William Andrew Nelson was born Sept. 11, 1984 in Bakersfield, Calif. He is the son of William and Amy Nelson and Rhonda and Bill Blythe of Bakersfield, Calif. He has an older sister Danielle, a 16-year-old brother, Colt, who competes in rodeo and a younger sister, Hailee.
