Sharing the same name, sophomores Josephine “JoJo” Gugger and Josephine “JoJo” Cesar participated in the 2026 Nike Indoor Nationals for track and field, a competitive track meet for high school athletes at The Nike Track & Field Center at The Armory in New York City from March 12 to March 15.
Gugger is a distance runner who regularly competes in the 800-meter run, mile and two-mile runs, while Cesar is a sprinter who prefers hurdling but often does high jumps and long jumps. During their first appearance at Indoor Nationals, both ran in the sprint medley relay (SMR), a four-person track event consisting of 200, 200, 400 and 800 meters legs. The relay team included junior Rebecca Palmer, Cesar, senior Jill Belniak and Gugger, respectively.
While the SMR team finished in 4:43.44, Head coach Patrick Galvin unofficially timed Gugger’s 800 split on his stopwatch as around 2:39.00.
“I [typically] run the 4×800, and I ran the open 800 a few times in outdoor,” Gugger said. “Normally I stick to the mile, but I definitely want to get faster at the 800. I want to be able to run closer to a 2:30.00 or even sub-2:30.00 in the 800 because right now I’m running [a personal record of around] 2:36.00.”
To reach Indoor Nationals, Gugger participated in a running sport year-round: cross country, indoor track and field and outdoor track and field. During this past indoor season, Galvin upped the mileage on the easy runs for distance runners.
“Our easy runs went from three miles to four miles at around a nine-minute pace,” Gugger said. “The upped mileage was new, but it definitely helped us have more endurance.”
Meanwhile, Cesar sprinted the second 200-meter leg of the SMR with an unofficial time around 27-28 seconds in addition to the 55-meter shuttle hurdle with Belniak, Niamh O’Sullivan and Palmer.
“Even though our team got disqualified because of my false start, everyone PR’ed [achieved a personal record] in that meet,” Cesar said. “Everyone ran really, really well, and just being at Nike and being able to do that there was really cool. Even though it didn’t count, it was still pretty awesome.”
Last year, Cesar fractured her foot and was unable to participate in track and field as an athlete; so instead, she helped the team as a manager. Now that Cesar is healed, she is excited to be back and is ready to race again.
“I was thinking that this year would be about getting back to where I was kind-of-year,” Cesar said. “But then, it ended up taking a turn where our team was so great that we were able to qualify for Nationals right away in the relay race.”
Apart from the meet, Gugger and Cesar also cherish their friendship and close bond. Throughout the years, they’ve shared many valuable memories being on the track team together.
“Me and JoJo have known each other since kindergarten,” Cesar said. “We played soccer together and we always came up with different names to call each other to tell the difference between the two JoJos.”
Along with their friendship, Gugger and Cesar also share experiences having identical names. As the only two students with the name in the entire grade, the experience is special and unique.
“One of us runs sprints, and one of us runs distance, so it’s normally really easy to tell which one of us they’re talking to,” Gugger said. “Like if they’re calling JoJo for high jumps and hurdles, I know that’s not me. It also makes it easier when I [run] distance, there’s only one Jojo in sprints. It’d be confusing if we both did the same events, but we do pretty much the most opposite events that we could possibly do.”
Galvin also acknowledges Gugger and Cesar’s friendship and recognizes specific qualities that bring them success overall.
“Both JoJo Gugger and JoJo Cesar are dedicated track and field student athletes,” Galvin said. “They love to compete, and I love watching them race, because I know they will give everything they have to be the best they can be every single meet. They are both great teammates, maintain a relaxed and supportive team environment while always putting in the work.”
As a team, Cesar also emphasizes the traditions they relish and memories they make during meets.
“We like to make little elastics, and we put string on it and make a cool little hair tie,” Cesar said. “We usually do [this] for States or Nationals. This year for nationals we had one that was kind of a little bit different with some cool colors, and I kept that.”
Gugger also made many memories with her teammates both on and off the track. Her favorite was the team dinner at an Italian restaurant named Sicily Osteria in Times Square.
“The athletes left the team dinner a little bit early while the parents were waiting to pay, and we got to walk around Times Square and New York by ourselves,” Gugger said. “That was really fun.”
When Gugger and Cesar were not racing, they were cheering on their teammates and competitors from other schools.
“There were a lot of amazing runners there that we were watching throughout the day,” Gugger said. “It was pretty crazy.”
Galvin also believes the meet brought valuable memories and moments for the entire team.
“The Nike National Meet was a great experience for the girls on our team,” Galvin said “We had the opportunity to compete in multiple events against some of the best competition in the country.”
In the long run, Cesar has high hopes for the team and plans to keep pushing for more success. Even after a big race, Cesar is already back to practice and in full preparation for the next meet.
“I just ran the 400 meter hurdle race,” Cesar said. “That was my first time running that and that was really hard [and] really scary, probably one of the hardest events in track and I definitely think I just want to improve as much as I can in that event specifically.”
In order to continue her growth from the indoor season, Cesar is already training hard to achieve her goal for this outdoor season: qualify for States.
“Our new coach, [Matthew] Joachim, really helped show us new lifting strategies to help us be faster and have more endurance,” Cesar said. “Also, I do hurdles at least two times a week, and then I high jump kind of on the side. I’m now long jumping a lot more often too, about two times a week. Usually those events [take up] half a practice, and the other half of practice I’ll be doing either a sprint workout or a 400 hurdles workout.”
Joachim reminisces the experience and highlights the peak aspects of the meet.
“I think nationals was a fantastic opportunity for the girls to compete at a high level against some serious competition,” Joachim said. “Most athletes don’t get this chance, so just being there was awesome. I know both JoJos were super excited to be at the meet and it was great to see them enjoy the experience.”
The team hopes to participate in more events in the future, where they can race and build memories at the same time.
“[Outdoor] Nationals will also be happening,” Cesar said. “If we go to Nike Nationals, that will be in Oregon, and then New Balance Nationals is in Philadelphia.”
Galvin also hopes to become more involved in events down the road, and looks forward to what Gugger and Cesar can achieve in future meets.
“I am looking forward to both of the girls continuing to run personal bests in their respective events,” Galvin said. “ I hope they are able to compete at the state meet in the individual events and expect them to compete for the team on the relays.”
