Brendan Fennell - Pearl River High School - Class of 2003
Brendan Fennell was at a crossroads in his young but blossoming athletic career. He had made the varsity soccer team at Pearl River as a freshman and virtually lived and breathed the sport, having played travel soccer for as long as he could remember. But his talent for running fast was now complicating the issue. He made varsity track as an eighth grader and drew notice with his near-record-setting times in the mile as an eighth and ninth grader. He could do something very special in running if he dropped soccer for cross country. “If you want to be a state champion, come out for cross country,” Pirate track coach Rich Michalski told Brendan.
Brendan’s family athletic history had a foot in both camps. His oldest brother, Brian, was a state-caliber cross country runner. His brother Thomas, a year younger than Brian, was an All-County soccer standout. Brendan respected and admired both of his older brothers for their accomplishments on the athletic field.
“It was a tough decision,” says Brendan, whose mile times of 4:22 as a freshman and 4:37 as an eighth grader approached the state records for those grades. “Running those times sparked me. No other person my age was running those times. But it was a tough choice. I was 15 years old. I enjoyed hanging out in the locker room with the guys. I thought I would be leaving behind a whole team of guys in the fall. I thought the camaraderie in cross country would not be as much as in soccer. I didn’t realize how close knit we could become.”
Ultimately, and with some initial reluctance, Brendan chose cross country in the fall of sophomore year. Need we point out that he never regretted his decision? All he did was unleash one of the greatest three-year blitzes in Rockland cross country history, and tacked on two more ultra-successful years in spring track before a freak injury his senior year robbed him of a potentially record-breaking season.
In cross country, Brendan won New York State Class C title as a sophomore and junior, captured a Northeast Regional championship and qualified for two National Footlocker championship races, and was a three-time national scholastic All-American. He won three Rockland County and Section 1 titles apiece, set Rockland records for Van Cortlandt Park’s historic 2.5-mile course (12:30.2) and its 5K course (15:32.7), and won 12 individual titles, including two at the highly competitive Manhattan Invitational. In the NYS Federation meet, which encompasses all classes and divisions of the state, he finished fourth, third and fifth, respectively. Brendan was New York State Runner of the Year for his sophomore and senior classes and led Pearl River to three Section 1 and League II-C titles apiece, two Rockland County crowns and two NYS Class C runner-up finishes. It’s easy to see why he was voted Rockland County Cross Country Runner of the Decade in 2009.
“Brendan had quite a three-year run in his 10th-, 11th- and 12th-grade years,” says Michalski, who coached Brendan in cross country and spring track. Michalski attributed part of Brendan’s success to “the environment he grew up in. He was very competitive since he was a little boy, playing soccer and Gaelic football, and having two older brothers to emulate. He was so coachable and extremely team-oriented. His dedication and loyalty to the team was unquestioned.”
Despite his overwhelming success in cross country, Brendan actually favored track and considers himself a “track guy.” “There’s less margin for error in track,” he says. “It had to be the right day and the right circumstances to run well. It’s hard to ignore what I did in cross country, but I like track more.”
There’s no debating that Brendan’s track career ranks among the finest in Rockland history. As a sophomore he won the NYS Federation and Class B title in the 1,600-meter run in a school-record 4:13.0. As a junior he placed third in the prestigious Penn Relays high school mile in 4:11.94, which ranks No. 4 on the all-time Rockland list. He set NYS sophomore, Rockland County and Section 1 records in the 5,000 meters at 15:03.59. He is a two-time Rockland titleholder in the 3,000 and 4x800 relay, and won seven Section 1 titles combined in the 1,600 (three), 3,200 and 4x800. Brendan also set NYS sophomore class records in the mile (4:13.0) and 2,000 (5:38.7), a NYS junior class and school record in the 2,000 (5:33.5), and as a freshman he anchored the NYS Class B runner-up 4x800 and placed fourth in the state 1,600.
Believe it or not, Brendan was not a three-season runner. In the winter he took to the basketball hardwood. A ball-hawking 5-foot-7 guard, he played JV as a freshman and moved up to Coach Jerry Houston’s varsity team the next two years, making honorable mention All-County as a junior. In his senior year he gave up basketball and had big plans for his final outdoor season, but then adversity struck in a most unusual way. He fractured his right hip while playing pickleball (yes, pickleball) in gym class. It wiped out his entire spring and affected his running for several months thereafter. [Ever the competitor, Brendan notes he was winning the pickleball game at the time of the injury, 11-7, over close friends Matt Vickers and Bill Cosgrove.]
The injury and his lack of year-round running dissuaded a number of recruiting college coaches, but one coach who stood by him and made good on his commitment was American University’s Matt Centrowitz, a two-time Olympic distance runner originally from New York. Centrowitz had a St. John’s connection with Jerry Houston Sr., Brendan’s summer league basketball coach, and he helped persuade Brendan to give up hoops and concentrate on maximizing his running potential. “He told me that a good runner runs 365 days a year,” Brendan says. “That’s how a runner gets good. I just wanted to compete, but he asked me how high a level I wanted to compete at. Did I want to be better than the guy next door, or one of the best in the country?”
Under Centrowitz’s tutelage – and after recovering fully from the hip injury – Brendan developed into one of the marquee runners in the Northeast at American, which he attended on partial scholarship. In cross country he won two Patriot League individual titles and finished second twice, was a four-time first team All-Patriot League selection, and qualified for the NCAA Div. I nationals four times – three times with his team and once individually. In indoor track, he was 2007 Patriot League mile champion in 4:06.67, second-fastest in school history, and also ranks in the top five in program history in the 3,000 (8:07.01, No. 2), 5,000 (14:23.92, No. 4) and 1,000 (2:26.77, No. 5).
During outdoor track, Brendan won the 2007 Patriot League title in the 1,500 (3:46.51) and set school records in the mile, 4:03.19; 5,000, 13:51.67, and as a leg on the 4xMile, 16:27.14, achieved at the Penn Relays. While chasing qualifying times at the end of the season, Brendan traveled to the Oregon Twilight Meet and clocked a personal-best 3:43.26 for 1,500 meters – the equivalent of a 4:01 mile. The race fell on the same day as his college graduation. “I skipped my graduation ceremonies to run a PB,” Brendan notes wryly. “My mom (Eileen) had mixed feelings about it, but she realized it meant a lot to me.”
Brendan’s parents, Thomas and Eileen, were a constant source of support for him throughout his athletic career, as were his siblings – Brian, Thomas and Tara – and the rest of the extended Fennell clan. “I had a great support system that led me to develop in high school,” he says. “My team, my coaches, my family, they all contributed to my success.”
After graduating from American in 2008 with a degree in finance and real estate, Brendan went to work in the construction industry. He currently serves as a senior project manager for a construction management firm, Wesbuilt Construction, in Manhattan. Brendan, who's 33, had knee surgery for a torn meniscus last July, putting an end to his days of playing basketball and Gaelic football. He does, however, hope to resume running again soon after a period of transition with biking. Brendan and his wife of six years, Megan (Wettje), live in Pearl River.
Brendan Fennell was at a crossroads in his young but blossoming athletic career. He had made the varsity soccer team at Pearl River as a freshman and virtually lived and breathed the sport, having played travel soccer for as long as he could remember. But his talent for running fast was now complicating the issue. He made varsity track as an eighth grader and drew notice with his near-record-setting times in the mile as an eighth and ninth grader. He could do something very special in running if he dropped soccer for cross country. “If you want to be a state champion, come out for cross country,” Pirate track coach Rich Michalski told Brendan.
Brendan’s family athletic history had a foot in both camps. His oldest brother, Brian, was a state-caliber cross country runner. His brother Thomas, a year younger than Brian, was an All-County soccer standout. Brendan respected and admired both of his older brothers for their accomplishments on the athletic field.
“It was a tough decision,” says Brendan, whose mile times of 4:22 as a freshman and 4:37 as an eighth grader approached the state records for those grades. “Running those times sparked me. No other person my age was running those times. But it was a tough choice. I was 15 years old. I enjoyed hanging out in the locker room with the guys. I thought I would be leaving behind a whole team of guys in the fall. I thought the camaraderie in cross country would not be as much as in soccer. I didn’t realize how close knit we could become.”
Ultimately, and with some initial reluctance, Brendan chose cross country in the fall of sophomore year. Need we point out that he never regretted his decision? All he did was unleash one of the greatest three-year blitzes in Rockland cross country history, and tacked on two more ultra-successful years in spring track before a freak injury his senior year robbed him of a potentially record-breaking season.
In cross country, Brendan won New York State Class C title as a sophomore and junior, captured a Northeast Regional championship and qualified for two National Footlocker championship races, and was a three-time national scholastic All-American. He won three Rockland County and Section 1 titles apiece, set Rockland records for Van Cortlandt Park’s historic 2.5-mile course (12:30.2) and its 5K course (15:32.7), and won 12 individual titles, including two at the highly competitive Manhattan Invitational. In the NYS Federation meet, which encompasses all classes and divisions of the state, he finished fourth, third and fifth, respectively. Brendan was New York State Runner of the Year for his sophomore and senior classes and led Pearl River to three Section 1 and League II-C titles apiece, two Rockland County crowns and two NYS Class C runner-up finishes. It’s easy to see why he was voted Rockland County Cross Country Runner of the Decade in 2009.
“Brendan had quite a three-year run in his 10th-, 11th- and 12th-grade years,” says Michalski, who coached Brendan in cross country and spring track. Michalski attributed part of Brendan’s success to “the environment he grew up in. He was very competitive since he was a little boy, playing soccer and Gaelic football, and having two older brothers to emulate. He was so coachable and extremely team-oriented. His dedication and loyalty to the team was unquestioned.”
Despite his overwhelming success in cross country, Brendan actually favored track and considers himself a “track guy.” “There’s less margin for error in track,” he says. “It had to be the right day and the right circumstances to run well. It’s hard to ignore what I did in cross country, but I like track more.”
There’s no debating that Brendan’s track career ranks among the finest in Rockland history. As a sophomore he won the NYS Federation and Class B title in the 1,600-meter run in a school-record 4:13.0. As a junior he placed third in the prestigious Penn Relays high school mile in 4:11.94, which ranks No. 4 on the all-time Rockland list. He set NYS sophomore, Rockland County and Section 1 records in the 5,000 meters at 15:03.59. He is a two-time Rockland titleholder in the 3,000 and 4x800 relay, and won seven Section 1 titles combined in the 1,600 (three), 3,200 and 4x800. Brendan also set NYS sophomore class records in the mile (4:13.0) and 2,000 (5:38.7), a NYS junior class and school record in the 2,000 (5:33.5), and as a freshman he anchored the NYS Class B runner-up 4x800 and placed fourth in the state 1,600.
Believe it or not, Brendan was not a three-season runner. In the winter he took to the basketball hardwood. A ball-hawking 5-foot-7 guard, he played JV as a freshman and moved up to Coach Jerry Houston’s varsity team the next two years, making honorable mention All-County as a junior. In his senior year he gave up basketball and had big plans for his final outdoor season, but then adversity struck in a most unusual way. He fractured his right hip while playing pickleball (yes, pickleball) in gym class. It wiped out his entire spring and affected his running for several months thereafter. [Ever the competitor, Brendan notes he was winning the pickleball game at the time of the injury, 11-7, over close friends Matt Vickers and Bill Cosgrove.]
The injury and his lack of year-round running dissuaded a number of recruiting college coaches, but one coach who stood by him and made good on his commitment was American University’s Matt Centrowitz, a two-time Olympic distance runner originally from New York. Centrowitz had a St. John’s connection with Jerry Houston Sr., Brendan’s summer league basketball coach, and he helped persuade Brendan to give up hoops and concentrate on maximizing his running potential. “He told me that a good runner runs 365 days a year,” Brendan says. “That’s how a runner gets good. I just wanted to compete, but he asked me how high a level I wanted to compete at. Did I want to be better than the guy next door, or one of the best in the country?”
Under Centrowitz’s tutelage – and after recovering fully from the hip injury – Brendan developed into one of the marquee runners in the Northeast at American, which he attended on partial scholarship. In cross country he won two Patriot League individual titles and finished second twice, was a four-time first team All-Patriot League selection, and qualified for the NCAA Div. I nationals four times – three times with his team and once individually. In indoor track, he was 2007 Patriot League mile champion in 4:06.67, second-fastest in school history, and also ranks in the top five in program history in the 3,000 (8:07.01, No. 2), 5,000 (14:23.92, No. 4) and 1,000 (2:26.77, No. 5).
During outdoor track, Brendan won the 2007 Patriot League title in the 1,500 (3:46.51) and set school records in the mile, 4:03.19; 5,000, 13:51.67, and as a leg on the 4xMile, 16:27.14, achieved at the Penn Relays. While chasing qualifying times at the end of the season, Brendan traveled to the Oregon Twilight Meet and clocked a personal-best 3:43.26 for 1,500 meters – the equivalent of a 4:01 mile. The race fell on the same day as his college graduation. “I skipped my graduation ceremonies to run a PB,” Brendan notes wryly. “My mom (Eileen) had mixed feelings about it, but she realized it meant a lot to me.”
Brendan’s parents, Thomas and Eileen, were a constant source of support for him throughout his athletic career, as were his siblings – Brian, Thomas and Tara – and the rest of the extended Fennell clan. “I had a great support system that led me to develop in high school,” he says. “My team, my coaches, my family, they all contributed to my success.”
After graduating from American in 2008 with a degree in finance and real estate, Brendan went to work in the construction industry. He currently serves as a senior project manager for a construction management firm, Wesbuilt Construction, in Manhattan. Brendan, who's 33, had knee surgery for a torn meniscus last July, putting an end to his days of playing basketball and Gaelic football. He does, however, hope to resume running again soon after a period of transition with biking. Brendan and his wife of six years, Megan (Wettje), live in Pearl River.