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Editor’s Note: This is the second installment of the Vail Daily’s “Where Are They Now” series, featuring local athletes — past and present — throughout the month of January.

Sean Matheson knew he had the 200-meter state title in the bag when he came off the turn in the lead. One thing he didn’t know: the stakes. 

“Man, that’s so long ago. Let me think here,” he said with a chuckle when asked to go back in time 20 years on a phone call this fall. “I knew nothing of what was on the line.”

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“We kept it a secret,” said his former Eagle Valley teammate Brad Gamble. “One, we knew he would win but you also didn’t want to create any reason for him to not be himself and over stress.”

Matheson — known for his quiet competitive streak — remembered his main rival in the race, Gunnison’s Brian Bollig.

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“We had been going back and forth all year,” Matheson said. “I just remembered once I hit that corner, if I had the lead, I knew I had him.” Matheson finished 0.13 ahead of Bollig, earning the 10 points needed for Eagle Valley to tie D’Evelyn for a share of the 2004 state track and field team title.

“That was a big memory in my childhood,” Gamble added. “Sitting there watching and basically being able to exhale halfway through like, ‘he’s going to win this.'”

Matheson and Gamble walked away from the 3A meet with four gold medals each. Gamble set the state record in 110 and 300-meter hurdles and long jump and was part of the winning 4×100-meter relay squad. Matheson was on that relay and the 4×200 and also claimed 100 and 200-meter individual crowns. Together with Alex Gamble, Russell Allen and Wes Minett, there was no shortage of short-distance talent on the Devils team. The team also got a fifth-place discus finish from Jacob Rivera.

“That team was small, but wicked fast and talented,” recalled head coach Jeff Shroll. “They were also just super fun to coach. No drama — just fun and speed.”

“We were pretty close,” Matheson added. “We always pushed each other. It was kind of a fun, competitive thing. Those guys really helped me get to where I needed to be.”

Brad Gamble credits the successes to the culture created by head coach Jeff Shroll. 

“He really created that atmosphere where it was just fun every day. You looked forward to practice,” he said. “(We) worked hard when we needed to work hard but then also had the freedom to joke around with our coaches and that kind of thing.” 

Shroll said that’s been his top priority throughout 28 years of coaching.

“Yes, we are going to work hard and some of it is going to be downright painful, but we are going to have fun as a team,” he described.

Brad Gamble was inspired to join the Eagle Valley track team by his tremendously athletic older brother, Chris, who claimed a 110-meter hurdles state title in 2001. Chris was a senior when Brad was a freshman. 

“Chris really helped create the standard and you had to live up to the standard — that was a really fun challenge,” Brad Gamble said. 

While his older brother transitioned from distance to hurdles when he joined the high school team, Brad had the advantage of starting on hurdles right away in middle school.

“That’s why I got to beat all of his records,” he explained. 

His 110-meter hurdle school record of , but Valley’s Aiden Brownell Brad Gamble’s 14.37 4A state meet record this spring by 0.01 seconds. Shroll was in Jeffco Stadium when the public address announcer proclaimed the new mark.

“Track and field records are made to be broken,” he said. “While the record fell, the memories of all Brad had to do to own that one for 19 years were truly remarkable.” 

Shroll said the entire 2004 team was a joy to coach.

“They made me laugh more than a coach should,” he said. “But when it was time suit up, they really brought all that they had.”   

Shroll is the county manager for Eagle County and still coaches for Eagle Valley. Rivera is now an engineer for the Town of Gypsum. Chris Gamble is married and currently lives in Bloomington, Minnesota and Alex Gamble graduated from Montana State and lives and works in the Denver area. Brad Gamble decided to follow his older brother to Hastings College. Despite his prep resume, he didn’t receive many college offers. The plan was to try decathlon. 

“I’ve always been intrigued by that because growing up you play five sports throughout the year, and (I liked) being busy with something I really enjoyed,” Brad Gamble said regarding the 10-discipline event. Unlike high school, however, Brad couldn’t match Chris’ collegiate accomplishments — at least right away. 

“I just didn’t have the success I was hoping for,” Brad Gamble said. 

While Chris Gamble left as Hastings’ decathlon record holder, his younger brother lost his freshman year to a back injury and followed that up with three so-so campaigns before graduating. In 2010, he moved home to complete his student teaching at Eagle Valley High School. 

“I was done with my career and had kind of a bitter look towards track because in high school I was really good and then in college I just never got better,” Brad Gamble said. He coached throws for the Devils under Shroll that spring. At the state meet, he ran into then-Chadron State assistant coach Matt Sparks, who said he had an open roster spot. 

And so, Brad Gamble decided to make a comeback in 2011. He capitalized on his final year of eligibility — courtesy of a redshirt freshman season at Hastings — winning the NCAA DII indoor national title in the heptathlon and finishing runner-up in the decathlon in the outdoor season. 

“I think looking back, the competition shaped me by teaching me failure and success,” Brad Gamble said. “It’s OK to fail and it’s OK to win and neither one need to be dwelled on too much.” 

That lesson has come to bear during his coaching career as well. After his athletic career was over, Brad Gamble signed on as an assistant at Chadron State. He eventually became head coach and produced 26 All-Americans and 36 Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference champions. He also led the women’s team to the 2016 outdoor conference championship and a third-place finish at the 2017 NCAA DII indoor national meet. After that season, he left for Colorado Mesa University and built the program into a conference contender. In addition to helping the school build an outdoor facility, he also led the Mavericks to their best RMAC finish in program history last spring.

“You have years that go well and others that don’t,” he continued. “I’ve been very lucky and I feel very blessed in my life, but a lot of my failures in track have helped me keep my ego in check throughout all my good times and bad.”

Despite becoming the school’s first RMAC coach of the year, Gamble resigned at the end of the season along with cross-country coach Shane Niksic. Gamble said although he felt supported by administration for the majority of his tenure, he sensed a shift when Joan McDermott took over as athletic director in the fall of 2023.

“You don’t know you’re in a toxic relationship until you leave it,” said Gamble, who could tell McDermott wanted a “distance-led” track program. He said in general the leadership group was “difficult to be around” and created a “hostile environment.”

“I did not not want to leave,” he continued. “But I’m so happy I did.”

Gamble announced his resignation on June 3. Three days later, McDermott and Taya Baumgartner, director of compliance, hosted a Zoom meeting with CMU athletes to discuss the changes. It didn’t go well.

“She gave us 10 minutes of her time after she fired our coach and changed all of our lives,” athlete Katie Thompson in an October story.

Afterward, Thompson for “professional treatment of CMU coaching staff and athletes,” which garnered over 1,000 signatures. In many ways, Thompson’s story mirrors Gamble’s: she relocated from Cheyenne to Grand Junction specifically because of Gamble’s vision for her in the multi events. In 2024, she captured the 2024 RMAC Indoor heptathlon title. In a phone call on Saturday, Gamble became emotional thinking about his former athlete going to bat for him.

“It was a really powerful feeling to see the positive impact I had on athletes,” he said. “And then it was really hard to see the direct negative impact the decision the school made (had) on the student-athletes.”

In its collected nearly 400 pages of emails and conducted on and off-record interviews with stakeholders, student-athletes and CMU President John Marshall. The story stated athletes were “at a loss” and “infuriated” by the university’s handling of the situation.

A week ago, Gamble started his next chapter as the assistant track coach in charge of jumps and multi-event athletes at the University of Idaho. Ironically, Idaho’s former distance coach, Travis Floeck, swapped positions and is now the director of cross-country and track and field at CMU.

“I’m so happy to be somewhere that is the exact opposite feeling each day than where I was,” Gamble said. “I miss my former staff, my former team dearly. But, life takes mysterious turns and I’m excited to live somewhere new.”

Running, records and relationships

Matheson joined the Eagle Valley track team as a sophomore before that legendary 2004 season — wherein he set the still-standing 100 and 200-meter records — to develop speed for football. 

“Football was the center of my life then,” he said. “I didn’t come (into track) with any expectations.” 

After graduation, he received a few offers to run from smaller schools, but chose to play football at Colorado Mesa University. He registered 42 tackles and an interception during his senior season. That spring, the school added track and Matheson had a chance to join. 

“I decided to take the easy way and coast on to graduation,” he said. “Definitely proud of what I did in football, but looking back, I kind of wish I could have found out how much faster I could have gotten.”

But Matheson hasn’t gotten soft. He trains five to six days a week for cross-fit competitions these days. For him, sports has always been about self-improvement. 

“I carry that competitiveness with me always,” he said. “I always believe in hard work — that’s how I’ve always been brought up.”

Originally intending to go into education, Matheson went right from college graduation to his post with the Town of Gypsum, moving from parks to streets to his current position in the water department as utility services supervisor. He also met and married his wife Ashley — also an Eagle Valley High School graduate. The couple currently has two kids: Coulter, 7 and Nora, 4.

“I’m not trying to be biased, but he’s going to be a strong kid,” he said when asked about his son’s athletic prospects. “He loves football and he’s always sprinting around everywhere. … Hopefully my records stay up there long enough for him to take them down.” 

Reflecting on that special season two decades ago, Shroll said “it was a true honor” to be the boys’ coach.

“Maybe someday we can all meet and have a heck of a poker game,” he joked. “Although I am not sure I trust Russell enough to play poker with him. I might lose my house!”

While Shroll said he appreciates the records and titles, the relationships are what has stuck. The coach has started to work with former athletes’ kids and has even officiated six weddings for past track team members.

“I see former athletes everywhere,” he said. “And I am so proud of all that they have become.”