It was the spring of Adrianna Rodencal. There she went gracefully gliding over barriers on her way to the 60-meter hurdle national title in Gainesville, Fla., in March and then to another in the 100-meter hurdles in Asheville, N.C., in May. Three separate times in a six-week span she was named the women’s NAIA National Outdoor Track Athlete of the Week. In her closing semester, she went to meets like the Sevigne Husker Invitational and the Drake Relays and consistently knocked off competitors from the NCAA Division I level.
As a senior, Rodencal’s star shined brighter than ever. Those who witnessed her saw greatness at its highest form when it comes to Concordia University, Nebraska Track & Field. From an entertainment standpoint, she was as reliable as Cirque du Soleil, never failing to come through no matter the stakes or the audience.
In her final collegiate meet, Rodencal went out on top. As she said days later, “It was everything I could have asked for. We went into outdoor season going, we got one national champ – let’s make it two … To be first and second place in the hurdles (at outdoor nationals) and be GPAC Athlete of the Year is kind of crazy.”
The results over four years as a Bulldog were out of this world – two national titles, eight NAIA All-America medals, five GPAC Athlete of the Year awards, 14 GPAC championships and school and GPAC meet records across the board in all hurdles events. She also averaged straight A’s while earning Academic All-America status as a Biochemistry major. It felt like there was nothing she couldn’t achieve if she set her mind to it.
Such unprecedented success didn’t happen by accident. The accolades are a byproduct of all the unseen hours spent conditioning, lifting and training mentally, physically and spiritually. Many of those hours over the past four years have been spent alongside her event coach Mark Samuels, an influential mentor in her life. On the day of a meet, Rodencal dives into the Bible, journals and listens to uplifting music. She’s also known to tear into a pack of Trolli’s for her meet day sugar fix.
Those who see her actions on a daily basis are less surprised by her many accomplishments. Said Head Track & Field Coach Matt Beisel following the 2026 indoor national meet, “Adrianna has always had high expectations. You can have high expectations and not do the things you need to do to achieve those expectations. Here’s somebody that lives the lifestyle, takes care of the details, plans ahead, develops the proper mindset and is then able to reach these heights … She’s a great example to the rest of our athletes. You’ve got this ability, now here’s how you go about maximizing your chances at achieving success.”
Rodencal seems to think of every last detail without reaching the point of obsession. Her thoughtfulness extends to her coaches, professors, friends and teammates. In the aftermath of the tragic accident that claimed the life of teammate Matthew Wing and hospitalized another teammate, Noah Ramirez, Rodencal shared on social media how the team was honoring both Matthew and Noah. The tragedy provided perspective for Rodencal and everyone close to the situation.
The senior version of Rodencal was equipped to handle just about anything. Eventually, she understood that it was okay not to be perfect. Says Rodencal, “My freshman year, I thought I had to take it all on my own. I thought I had to be perfect every time I got on the track and every time I sat down for a test. That was a very rude awakening when that obviously didn’t happen. I just say to take everything as it comes and take time to work on yourself.”
The path to national championship glory
Immense expectations followed Adrianna Rodencal as she transitioned from Lincoln Lutheran High School to Concordia. Over her junior and senior years as a prep, Rodencal raked in a combined eight individual state gold medals, a two-year total achieved only once before in the history of Nebraska Class C girls track and field. Is that perfection? That was the question an Omaha World-Herald reporter asked Rodencal in the aftermath of four more state golds as a senior. She replied, “Near perfection.”
At her final state meet, Rodencal won the 100 hurdles, 100 meters, 300 hurdles and 200 meters, in that order (she was also part of a 4x100-meter relay state champion). Her time in the 100 hurdles was the fastest across all Nebraska classes at the 2022 state meet. In other words, it was a big deal for Coach Matt Beisel and his staff to land Rodencal, the daughter of Concordia alums Joel and Korinna. It was a natural fit. As Rodencal said, “When I finally toured, I felt the family with not just the track team but also the community of Seward and everyone on campus. I was like, ‘this is really what I want.’” As Coach Samuels said of her recruitment, “It was pretty clear that the experience was more important than chasing the high-end dream of trying to be Division I.”
The journey ahead confirmed what Adrianna believed: she found the right place for her, roughly a 35-minute drive from where she attended high school. But if she believed everything was going to be smooth sailing from here, she had another thing coming. It would take until her junior year before she would become an NAIA All-American for the first time. It felt like a letdown for the ultra-competitive Rodencal, who certainly enjoyed other early successes, as exemplified by her freshman year sweep of women’s GPAC Athlete of the Year awards and a quick resetting of the 60 hurdles school standard.
Even so, she felt like she had much more to give. The close calls as a sophomore were particularly gut-wrenching. At the 2024 NAIA Indoor Championships, Rodencal missed the finals of the 60 hurdles by .01 seconds. Then at the 2024 NAIA Outdoor Championships, she fell .01 seconds off a qualifying time in the 100 hurdles. Seriously, in back-to-back national meets she was a mere one-hundredth of a second too slow. Rodencal called it a “God-has-a-different-plan-for-me moment.” Looking back, Samuels believes these circumstances “really drove her to take the next step in her training and refine her day-to-day routine with what it takes to achieve what she wanted to achieve.”
What others didn’t know at the time was that Rodencal was just beginning her path to superstardom on the collegiate level. As a sophomore, Rodencal learned something about herself that would become a gamechanger. It was during Christmas break of her sophomore year that she decided to have her iron levels checked by a doctor. As a Biochemistry major, Rodencal can give you a complete (and nerdy) breakdown of what was going on with her body. Long story short, she discovered she was iron deficient, causing her to experience “drop offs” during training sessions.
Drawing from his experience coaching distance runners, Beisel first suggested to Rodencal that she may have low iron levels. Once the issue was pinpointed, Rodencal began taking iron supplements while also adding iron-rich foods to her diet. In a sport where hundredths of a second matter, Rodencal was determined to raise her game any way she could. As Rodencal said, “With my iron levels more normal, I was able to do more reps more competitively in practice, maintaining the times Coach Samuels wanted.”
Of course, it wasn’t all about iron levels. But with this awareness added to her already elite work ethic, Rodencal took off while making a statement on the national scene. At the national championships, from sophomore to junior year, she improved her 60 hurdles time from 8.59 to 8.44 and her 100 hurdles time from 14.43 to 13.54. Additionally, she met the challenge of taking on the 400 hurdles, an event that arguably became her best – and one she was reluctant to try. All the while, Rodencal went up against some of the greatest hurdlers in NAIA history.
Four All-America awards as a junior felt sweet. It also felt well-earned. Adrianna placed as the NAIA national runner up in the 400 hurdles in May 2025. She nearly won the title. When January 2026 arrived, Adrianna wore all four of her All-America medals while posing for photos during the team’s media day photoshoot. Entering her senior year, Adrianna said she wanted to make sure she enjoyed it and soaked up moments like these with her teammates.
At the same time, she had some BIG dreams in mind. Said Rodencal just before the start of the ’26 indoor season, “Being able to accomplish that as a junior after missing the mark just barely the first two years, I’m very grateful for that. I hit the mark that I had been going for, so I had to sit back this summer and let myself take it in and fully absorb it. I haven’t changed my goals – not big changes. I want to focus this year on having fun and enjoying time with my teammates. The next big step would be national champion. Coach Samuels and I have talked about that. It’s a big ask, but we both came into this year wanting that. I know we can push to do that, so that’s the next big step this year.”
The spring of Adrianna Rodencal
‘The spring of Adrianna Rodencal’ was made possible by the relentless drive and unwavering spirit inside Adrianna, born and bred in Lincoln. For the Warriors of Lincoln Lutheran, Rodencal competed for state championship winning teams in both track and field and volleyball. She first became a hurdler in the seventh grade at the urging of Lincoln Lutheran assistant coach Harrison Martin (with additional support coming from Coach Joel Janecek). At first, Adrianna balked.
As she recalls, “I didn’t want to do that. I thought, that’s extra work. Let’s just keep running. He was pretty insistent on it … It was super fun so I kind of committed to it for high school. It ended up being really good and I had a really good hurdles coach.”
Rodencal found another fruitful athlete-coach relationship at Concordia with her event coach, Mark Samuels, a veteran Bulldog who has inspired many athletes to reach their full potential over nearly two decades as an assistant. Samuels has been there for the highs and lows of Rodencal’s career.
“She’s very special and unique,” Samuels said. “She loves track and field. She’s constantly learning and improving what she’s doing by watching others. All those little things help. When you get to a certain level, you have to get a lot more detail-oriented to keep improving. The way she can balance the academic load with her focus day-to-day on what she wants to accomplish is pretty special. Not everybody has that.”
In the spring of 2026, there weren’t too many lows, at least not from a track perspective. There were no drop-offs or off days. During the ’26 indoor season, Rodencal won EVERY single 60-meter hurdles race she competed in – prelims, finals, everything – at eight meets. She proved herself capable of competing on any level, as evidenced by her winning the 60 hurdles at the Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational. So dominant in the event, Rodencal ran nine separate 60-hurdle times faster than any other NAIA women’s athlete ran throughout the 2026 season.
At the 2026 NAIA Indoor Championships, Rodencal left no doubt. She broke her own school record by running 8.25 in the finals of the 60 hurdles (second place ran 8.44). Understandably, the emotions poured out. There were tears and emotional embraces shared with the likes of Samuels, coaches, teammates and her parents. She could now be referred to as “national champion Adrianna Rodencal.” As she said days after the meet, “To be able to say national champion now is a dream made reality.”
Samuels understood the type of pressure Rodencal felt as a national favorite heading into the meet in March. Said Samuels, “The mindset wasn’t just that my goal is to win. It was that I should win. I’m expected to win. There was that extra pressure on her shoulders. It takes a lot of discipline to manage all that. She knew she was in an event where it doesn’t take much to have something go wrong. It was a special moment to put all those years and preparation behind it with that being the No. 1 goal. To actually have it happen was pretty special.”
The frustration she felt from those national meets as a sophomore washed away. She was a runaway freight train that could not be stopped. As an illustration of her consistency, Adrianna was named the NAIA National Track Athlete of the Week on Feb. 9 and May 4 by the USTFCCCA and on April 1, April 22 and May 6 by the NAIA National Office. According to the USTFCCCA lists, Rodencal is the owner of NAIA all-time rankings of third in the 100 hurdles, fourth in the 60 hurdles and 19th in the 400 hurdles.
To top off her career, Rodencal seized her fifth career GPAC Athlete of the Year award after re-breaking her own conference meet records in the 100 and 400 hurdles events. At a new location for the NAIA Outdoor Championships, Asheville, N.C., Rodencal cruised to a national title in the 100 hurdles (13.57) and placed runner up in the 400 hurdles in a personal best of 57.98 (in a photo finish). Her final All-America award – No. 8 in her career – came as part of the team’s 4x4 relay (another event that features her name listed atop the school record books).
A couple weeks later, Rodencal reflected, “I wouldn't want the final day of my track career to go any other way. Being able to be surrounded by my coaches, teammates, and my family who have always been there for me was something I will always be grateful for. Of course, no track meet is complete without a little anxiety. New facilities, weather and just the general pressure were present and very real but having such a great support team helped me remain firm. When I crossed that finish line in the first race of the day, the 100 hurdles, I was at a loss for words. Coach and I had gone into this year with that goal: to be national champion in the hurdle races. To actually say that we did it in both the 60 hurdles and the 100 hurdles was something amazing.”
Closing the chapter
The story of Adrianna Rodencal is about more than elite athletic achievement. The 5-foot-6 Nebraskan does more than just run fast around a track while clearing hurdles. Faith plays a major role in her everyday life. On meet days, she reserves plenty of time for devotion and prayer. She’s a “secluded person when it comes to track meets” but also an active participant in the celebration of the successes of her teammates.
Beyond that, “Rodey” (as some call her) loves a good Mexican restaurant (such as Las Margaritas in Lincoln) or a Mumford and Sons concert. She’s a supportive big sister to her brother Preston, also a standout athlete, and a fan of world record holding 400-meter hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone. At least in her mind, Adrianna doesn’t possess a specific hidden talent. She likes to read and sing and listen to music that gets her in the right headspace.
When she’s passionate about something, she’ll go after it with everything she’s got. Discipline and humility are pillars of her success. Her everyday habits are what make her who she is: prayer, study, lifting, training, sleep, proper nutrition, camaraderie and caring for others. No matter the heights she attains, she keeps pushing. It’s what made her a national champion x2.
Prior to the start of her senior season, Rodencal maturely stated, “It’s very easy for me to look at the results last year and go, ‘that’s exactly what I wanted,’ and then to almost expect it to happen again this year. I have to get in that mind space that every day I wake up, it’s not given. I’ve got a little sign on my mirror. You have to dedicate yourself every day. It’s not given to you. You have to prove your spot on the team and your spot from a nationals standpoint. I think it’s worked for me. You have to stay as humble as you can while also having confidence knowing you did that and you can do it again. I still have to put the work in to achieve better this year.”
Indeed, Adrianna trained like someone who saw the slate wiped clean every time she woke up in the morning. She equipped herself for elite performance in all aspects of life. Those “terrible Tuesdays” of training (as Adrianna and her teammates dubbed them for their grueling nature) did not go for nothing. She’s exactly the type of student-athlete Coach Beisel and the track program want to build around. But Adrianna Rodencals don’t grow on trees. She’s a generational Bulldog.
Says Beisel, “Adrianna is and has been a true blessing to the program. Obviously, her athletic accomplishments have been significant, but who she is as a teammate and leader have been just as important. We are grateful that God led her to Concordia and are so proud of all she has accomplished. A stellar student, a legendary athlete and a phenomenal teammate: she is truly exceptional.”
Rodencal made her mark as a collegiate student-athlete and now feels prepared to impact the world in meaningful ways. Rodencal is newly engaged to be married with a bright future ahead. She’ll always be a Bulldog.
“I’m beyond grateful for the coaches, teachers and for my teammates,” Rodencal said. “Being a student-athlete, you can’t do it on your own. You really need the friends around you. When you do fall back and you do fall behind, they keep boosting you up. I was so grateful I was able to have that and so grateful for the community I was able to build. I know when I come back for any reason, I will be welcomed with a warm hug.”
This summer, Adrianna started a job as a Laboratory Technician in the Virus Operations of Zoetis in Lincoln. She is still running and staying active as she now starts to plan a wedding and begin a new chapter of her life.
She adds in a closing reflection, “I am truly grateful for everyone who has been a part of my athletic career. For my coaches in middle school, high school and college who believed in me and my sometimes crazy ideas. For my teammates at all levels who have supported me and made me feel a part of a family. For my family who traveled to most all of my meets, no matter the distance, and who have seen me at the highs and the lows. Finally for the community of Concordia as a whole, those who kept up with each meet and cheered me on. I am forever grateful and praise God for the path that He has taken me! While I'll never get to represent Concordia on the track again, I will forever be Bulldog proud.”
Adrianna Rodencal by the numbers
· 2x NAIA National Champion
· 8x NAIA All-American
· 14x GPAC Champion (8x in hurdles, 3x in 200m, 3x in relays)
· 5x GPAC Athlete of the Year / 5x GPAC Most Outstanding Athlete of the Meet
· 41x GPAC All-Conference
· 3x NAIA Midwest Region Women’s Track Athlete of the Year
· 5x NAIA National Athlete of the Week
· 2025 Second Team Academic All-American (College Sports Communicators)
· 3x Academic All-District (College Sports Communicators)
· Holds indoor school record in the 60 hurdles (8.25) and outdoor school records in the 100 hurdles (13.04), 400 hurdles (57.98), 4x100m relay (46.80) and 4x400m relay (3:47.14)
· Owns GPAC meet records in all hurdles events
· Member of four GPAC championship winning teams and four that placed in the NAIA top 10
· 3x NAIA Scholar-Athlete