Braelyn Combe had a plan for Nike Indoor Nationals, and leading for most of it wasn't part of it.

The COROS NextGen athlete from Santiago High School in Corona, California had visualized every version of the race, and in every version, the thing that mattered most was the same: win. She'd watched the NCAA indoor mile championship earlier that week and noted how the field had bunched up and let the race come down to a kick. She figured high school nationals might look exactly the same.

She was right. She just didn't expect to be the one guiding the pack.

A Chip on Her Shoulder and a California Kid on the Indoor Circuit

Braelyn doesn't do indoor track. Not really. As a Southern California runner, her season doesn't typically open until spring, so the decision to race Nike Indoor Nationals meant cramming a preparation block into a window that most of her competition had weeks more time to develop.

She also carried something into the season that's harder to quantify than fitness: the sting of not making NXN as a senior after qualifying as a junior. "That was a hard pill to swallow," she said. "That kind of put a big chip on my shoulder going into track."

That chip has a way of sharpening things. Heading into the winter, the emphasis in training shifted — not away from what had always been her weapon (speed, a kick that closes out races), but toward what she'd been avoiding. "The workouts I kind of hated and neglected last year," she said, "which is the tempo and like longer threshold stuff." The two-day workout structure — one hard session early in the week, a lighter day if there's no race — got built around sharpening both ends: the 300s and 150s for raw speed, and the longer threshold runs for the engine underneath.

Building Toward Nike: Three Races, Three Data Points

Braelyn's coach built a three-race staircase leading into nationals. Each step was designed to answer a specific question.

The first was her season opener, the New Balance Grand Prix. She closed the race hard but left the track feeling like she'd left time on the table. That confidence shifted the conversation: instead of heading into Nike just to compete, the goal became running a time as close to 4:30 as possible.

The second step was a 3,200 — an event she'd barely trained for. It was an early-morning race, she wasn't feeling it, and she ran 9:59 anyway. Sub-10. Solo. "I really didn't think I'd be able to, especially by myself," she said. "But that made me think, okay, maybe I can do it."

The third step would have been an 800 to build confidence in her speed, but a windy day scratched those plans. Instead, she anchored a 4x400 relay that same afternoon. She split a 56. She had aced tests in both endurance and speed on the same day.

"That was another good confidence booster," she said, "the 9:59 and then the 56 double."

She boarded a flight to New York carrying those two numbers like a toolkit. If the race went honest, she had the endurance to hold it. If it came down to a kick, she had the speed. Both options were in the bag.

The Race Itself: Watching the Clock Go Out the Window

As she expected, the mile quickly turned into a tactical race. The part she wasn't expecting, though, was that she'd be the one at the front.

The first lap went out in 34, with Braelyn leading. She was hoping someone else would take the second lap and push the pace. Nobody did. The field drifted out to lane 3, bunched and cautious, collectively watching the clock drift away from any shot at a fast time.

"I kept looking up at the screen during the race, and we're all just in a big blob going out to lane 3," she said. "So I was like, okay, this looks like the NCAA race from Friday. I know how this race is going to be run."

A 40-second lap prompted a reaction from Abigail Anstett. She'd seen enough of that pace, and took the lead. Braelyn settled in and reset. The fast time was gone, but the race wasn't.

She went through 800 in 2:25 and decided to reframe the whole thing. "I wanted to change the story and show people how hard I could close, I guess. And how fast of a time we could still get even though it went out really slow." Braelyn retook the lead and set off to make every lap faster than the one before.

She closed in a 29-second final 200 and won the race in 4:38, holding off a late move from fellow COROS NextGen athlete Ellery Lincoln.

The DMR: Building the California Dream Team

Just a few hours after the individual mile, Braelyn ran another race — and by her own telling, it might have been the more meaningful one.

Nike introduced a new relay this year: a Distance Medley of all-star teams from each state. Braelyn treated the team-building process with the same intentionality she brings to race planning. "I thought of like, okay, I'm going to build like the California dream team," she said. She quickly recruited 400m leg Isla Bulmer, a childhood soccer teammate with sub-60 speed. Next was rising 800m star Grace Smith, and rounding out the team was fellow NextGen athlete Chiara Dailey on the 1200m leg.

"I love relays," she said. "That is like my biggest thing."

The team won. Braelyn anchored with a 4:37 mile leg. And after the relay, Braelyn noted that every athlete had split faster than they'd run in their individual events. She credited the energy in the room and the fact that they'd refused to take the moment for granted, as it might not come around again. Starting next year, the four stars will be scattered across the country among top collegiate teams.

So they made the most of it.

What's Next

Braelyn heads into the outdoor season with a national title, a sub-10 in the 3,200, and a 56 split in the 4x4 as her foundation. She's committed to the University of Arkansas and will race a full outdoor schedule, with the stated goal of running fast across the entire spectrum of distance events.

The chip on the shoulder is still there, and the toolkit is bigger than it's ever been.

Braelyn is a member of COROS NextGen, a program which aims to work with elite high school athletes as they push their boundaries to become the next generation of elite distance runners in the U.S. For any high school athlete chasing their best, head to www.coros.com to learn more on products, training tips, and insights from athletes of all levels.