NEW BRIGHTON, Minn. – A wrong turn, a confused shrug, and one heck of a pair of sneakers just rewrote the record books at the New Brighton Mother’s Day 5K/10K.

Nine-year-old Kade Lovell was supposed to toe the line with hundreds of other kids and casual joggers for the 3.1-mile fun run last Saturday. Instead, a well-meaning spectator pointed the second-grader the wrong way at the starting corral, sending him straight onto the adult 10K course (6.2 miles, double the distance, and packed with seasoned runners).

Kade noticed something was off almost immediately.

“I kept passing grown-ups and nobody my age,” the freckle-faced kid told reporters after the race, still wearing the oversized champion’s medal that hung to his belly button. “I thought maybe all the kids were really fast… so I just kept running.”

He didn’t just keep running. He crushed it.

The pint-sized phenom crossed the 10K finish line in 48 minutes and 17 seconds (a blistering 7:47 per mile pace) beating the second-place adult male by more than two minutes and claiming the overall title. Race officials did a triple-take when they realized the new course champion was a 9-year-old who still has a lunchbox with Spider-Man on it.

“I thought we had a timing-chip glitch,” race director Tom Parent laughed. “Then this little dude walks up, hands on his hips, asking where the snacks are. We checked the bib number twice. It was real. He legitimately smoked everybody.”

Meanwhile, at the actual 5K finish line, Kade’s mom, Heather Lovell, had gone from mildly concerned to full-blown panic. Thirty minutes after the kids’ race should have ended, there was still no sign of her son.

“I’m picturing broken bones, kidnappers, everything a mom’s brain jumps to,” Heather said, clutching her phone. “Then my friend gets a text from someone at the 10K: ‘Hey, is this your kid iniling the finish line right now?’ I thought it was a joke… until I saw the photo of Kade holding the giant first-place trophy.”

When mother and son finally reunited, the waterworks started (happy ones this time).

“I hugged him so hard I almost knocked him over,” Heather laughed through tears. “He looks up at me and goes, ‘Mom, did I win the wrong race?’ Yeah, buddy. You won the wrong race… and the right one too.”

Kade, who plays travel soccer and runs a mile every day with his dad “just for fun,” shrugged off the hero treatment.

“I got kinda tired at mile five,” he admitted, kicking at the dirt with his neon sneakers. “But then I remembered my coach says, ‘When your legs hurt, run with your heart.’ So I did.”

That quote is now plastered on T-shirts being sold by the race organizers, with all proceeds going to the local elementary track program.

Local running coaches are already calling the kid “the next big thing.” One high school cross-country coach who witnessed the finish told Fox 9 Minneapolis, “I’ve been doing this 25 years and I’ve never seen a grade-schooler drop grown men like that. He wasn’t even breathing hard.”

As for Kade? He’s already back to normal life (soccer practice, Fortnite, and begging his mom for post-race ice cream).

When asked if he’ll do another 10K on purpose next time, he grinned ear-to-ear.

“Maybe. But only if they let me eat two ice creams if I win again.”

Race officials have officially retired bib No. 1877 (Kade’s number) and plan to hang it in the city hall lobby next to a blown-up photo of the 4-foot-6 champion crossing the line with a confused but triumphant fist pump.

Somewhere, a spectator is probably still apologizing.

And somewhere else, a bunch of very humbled adult runners are rethinking their training plans.