Beyond A Student Athlete: Braidon Nourse

Three sport athlete, all conference athlete, and state qualifier; senior Braidon Nourse definitely exceeds the bar on what a student athlete is.  

Braidon’s GPA is a 4.3, he runs track, plays soccer, and is even the kicker for the football team. He juggles all of this along with his personal life, and school. 

“He’s someone that sets his goals and uses those to make the most of what he can do personally, he always wants to get the most out of himself,” said head track and field coach Chris Carhart.

Believe it or not, this was Braidon’s first year playing football. He says he joined due to several teachers convincing him.

“If you would have told me my freshman year that I would make all conference in two sports in the same season; there is absolutely no way that I would have believed you,” said Nourse.

On November 1, Braidon had one of the most eventful days and perhaps even the most exhausting in his high school career. Nourse woke up in the morning to go to a choir concert, then battled for the Raiders in their narrow playoff loss to Arapahoe in soccer, and finally rushing back across town to his final football game. 

Nourse describes that day as a roller coaster saying, “The choir thing was pretty fun, I had to get up at 5:30 and we left the school at 6:30. When we got there, we were the first to perform meaning we had to sit through other performances for four hours. Then at the soccer game during half time I ended up throwing up because I ate too much Subway. Luckily, they postponed the football game because of the game before it so I actually ended up running onto the field right as they called my name for Senior night.”

Former teacher and coach of Nourse, Mr. Boyle, met Braidon his freshman year and had several great things to say about him, “For guys like him, things just look easy for them but he works really hard to get all the success he has. He makes it look easy but I don’t think everyone truly knows how hard he really works at practice, in class, and probably at home too.”

To end the soccer season, Braidon had 18 assists and that put him first in 5A,  and third in the state in assists, which was only three assists behind first.

He now is looking forward to track season where he hopes to become a state champion in the triple jump. Nourse’s record for the triple jump is a 43-10.

“If you ever see my interactions with the coaches, I always tell the ‘state-champ coach’ and I think I have a good chance of doing that,” said Nourse. 

Carhart believes Nourse could be a successful decathlete at the college level because of his athletic gifts and it is hard to disagree with that sentiment considering Nourse’s accomplishments already.

Braidon plans on going to his dream college; CSU after high school.

*Editors note: Braiden Nourse joined the Raider Review staff after this story was written.