Nathan Hogenmiller Finds the Right Ride for the Road Ahead
Story by Sara Locke // Photography by Bill Sitzmann
Nathan Hogenmiller took a winding road to a successful medical career and has enjoyed all of the sights along the way.
“I went to school in Omaha my whole life,” Hogenmiller said. “St. Joan of Arc for grade school, Creighton Prep for high school. University of Nebraska-Omaha for college, then the University of Nebraska Medical Center for a nursing degree. And now I’m graduating residency from UNMC.”
While his education and career have taken a few twists and turns, they served to remind him just how much the journey is the destination.
“I feel like my careers are a vast dichotomy,” he said. “Over the years, I realized if I knew more, I could do more. I could help in a more impactful way. I come from a healthcare family. I’d gone to nursing school. I decided to go back to school to become an ER doctor.”
While he didn’t initially hear the call to healthcare, it was always in the background.
“When I left Prep, I went to college with the intent to go to medical school, because it seemed like that was what I was supposed to do,” he said. “The push didn’t come from my parents, but rather from that general idea of, ‘If you get good grades, you’re smart, and you want to help people, then healthcare is the obvious career path.’ But it wasn’t a massive calling for me, so I left. I decided to go back in 2014, seven years later. There was a lot of course correction, and it took more classes and an accelerated learning program.”
The longer you head in a direction you didn’t intend, he said, the longer the road back becomes. But for Hogenmiller, there were no regrets, only sights to see along the way.
“I don’t necessarily recommend the path I took, but I’m really glad I did it,” he said. “It was humbling and enlightening.”
But the ride isn’t over, and it’s only getting better from here.
“Healthcare doesn’t give you pats on the back like other jobs do,” Hogenmiller said. “You can literally save a life, and your only thanks is seeing them leave the floor knowing that they would have died without you. Knowing for yourself that you’ve made a difference. But it isn’t a self-serving life. You’re doing your job just for the love of it.”
With a job as physically and emotionally taxing as emergency medicine, Hogenmiller believes it’s important to balance your life with hobbies and interests that ground and gratify you.
“I’m a motorsports guy,” he said. “I grew up racing motocross, go-karts. It’s always been an interest of mine.”
When undertaking his residency, Hogenmiller vowed that upon his graduation from the program, he would gift himself something that would marry his love of motorsports, travel, and luxury. His plan was to replace his well-loved Mustang with an upgraded version, but another future goal changed his mind.
“I just got married back in February,” he said. “Dane [Gengler] was helping me consider my options and mentioned that Mustangs don’t have four doors. Looking forward—thinking about starting a family—we were going to need something more practical.”
But the team at ONYX showed Hogenmiller that practical didn’t have to mean a minivan.
“I do a lot of traveling in the mountains, and I wanted something with turbos,” he said. “Dane suggested I look at a BMW, and I have always had a sweet spot for the M3.”
Hogenmiller recalled a high school acquaintance driving an E46 M3. “It had the manual sequential, so you didn’t have to use the clutch to switch between gears. It was brand new at the time and so cool,” he said. “I remembered that car so vividly and had kept my eye on a few M3s through the years. It had been on my mind, so when Dane suggested it, it finally just felt like the right time.”
Dane sent Hogenmiller to Daniel Schwartz, who walked him through the process.
“I had a great idea of what I wanted before I ever walked in,” Hogenmiller said. “I had my vehicle fully built online, but still had a lot of questions about specs and other options. Daniel made the buying process really straightforward.”
Hogenmiller is enjoying his 2027 BMW M3, even taking it to the first Sportscar Saturday of the year.
“It was crazy to have a 14-year-old kid come up to me and ask, ‘Is that thing dravit grey?’ It really just shows you that the M3 is truly an iconic motorsports car,” he said. “I’m hoping to instill that same appreciation into my future child.”
The journey has only just begun, and Hogenmiller may not know where he’s going next, but he knows exactly how he’s getting there.
“I’m going to travel the country with this car,” he said. “I know a lot of people will buy a vehicle like this and really baby it, but that’s not the plan. I’m putting snow tires on it. This is my daily drive, it has to go wherever I go.”
Visit onyxautomotive.com for more information.
