By Reggie Connell, Managing Editor
Growing up in St. Petersburg, I was never a big hockey fan, but I was fortunate enough to see
Wayne Gretzky play against the Tampa Bay Lightning in the late 90s. Gretzky was near the end of his career, but it was still a sports milestone to witness one of the all-time greats before he retired.
Gretzky was attributed with a quote that has stuck with me for decades.
“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”
It is a concept rooted in anticipation, an understanding of game flow, and the ability to recognize patterns before they fully take shape.
It’s also how Nick Nesta won the 2026 Apopka mayoral race.
Nesta won Tuesday's runoff in overwhelming fashion, receiving 62% of the votes after being the top vote-getter in the March general election.
It may seem like Nesta rode his momentum into the runoff, but this election was not decided in the final days of the runoff, or even during the general election. It was shaped over time as the city’s electorate shifted, becoming increasingly visible across multiple election cycles. By the time voters returned to the polls in April, the direction of the race had already been established.
The long-term trend is evident in Apopka Mayor Bryan Nelson’s trajectory of support in the last three elections.
In 2018, he won with 4,103 votes (63%) in an election with a turnout of 6,493. At the time, the most votes a candidate for mayor ever received.
In 2022, he was reelected with 3,643 votes (54%) as turnout increased to 6,775. His vote total and percentage dropped while turnout increased, an early signal that the electorate was changing.
By 2026, Nelson’s vote total plummeted to 2,147 (26%), while turnout climbed past 8,100. The electorate expanded, but his share declined again markedly, and this time beyond recovery.
Despite a late start to his campaign, Nesta aligned with that shift, while the other candidates emphasized experience and institutional relationships. His message spoke directly to what Apopka was calling for.
“I’m running because I believe Apopka deserves better transparency, better planning, and a reset at City Hall,”
Nesta said in an interview with The Apopka Voice. “We have to take a different approach to how decisions are made. It’s not about what we say we’re going to do. It’s about what actually gets done and how we deliver for residents.”
Those themes resonated because they reflected concerns that had already been building among residents as growth accelerated and questions about infrastructure and internal capacity became more immediate.
The general election confirmed that the political landscape had already changed.
Nesta finished first with 3,365 votes, establishing a clear lead in a three-way field that included both an incumbent mayor and a sitting Orange County commissioner. Christine Moore advanced to the runoff with 2,576 votes, while Nelson was eliminated with 2,147.
That outcome signaled that voters were not simply dissatisfied with the status quo, but were already consolidating around an alternative.
A month later, the runoff results reinforced that trajectory rather than altering it.
Despite Nelson endorsing Moore, thus consolidating the establishment vote, Nesta increased his vote total from 3,365 in the general election to 4,934 in the runoff, the highest total ever received by a mayoral candidate in Apopka. Moore also increased her total, rising from 2,576 to 3,032, but the gap between the candidates widened rather than narrowed. Assuming both candidates received their original voters from the general election, Nesta collected 77% of those additional voters. That dynamic is significant. Moore gained votes, but not enough to shift the race's direction. The increase suggests consolidation occurred, but Nesta’s support outpaced it by 1,113 votes!
Nelson’s endorsement likely contributed to Moore’s increased total, but that’s not where the puck was going.
Another indicator of momentum is voter registration. Following the general election, 562 new voters registered in time to participate in the runoff. That increase suggests that the race continued to generate engagement after March and that Nesta’s first-place finish helped draw additional participation.
Rather than a contraction of the electorate, the runoff saw continued expansion.
Turnout patterns further support that conclusion. Participation remained high and nearly matched the general election, which is atypical for a municipal runoff. That level of engagement indicates that voters viewed the runoff as a continuation of a consequential decision rather than a secondary event.
Nesta’s advantage was also reinforced by the consistency of his campaign.
There was no significant shift in messaging between the general election and the runoff. The campaign remained focused on the same themes from start to finish, strengthening the perception that it was aligned with voter concerns rather than reacting to them.
In the final weeks of the race, criticism of Nesta centered on conduct and experience. Commissioner Nadia Anderson accused him of helping draft complaints and legal challenges against her, citing emails suggesting his involvement, while Moore amplified those concerns, calling them “really, really troubling,” and questioned his temperament and readiness to lead.
Nesta did not engage those attacks directly; instead, he kept his campaign focused on core issues like growth, infrastructure, and how City Hall operates.
“Unnecessary controversy diverts focus from these priorities,” his campaign said. “The voters deserve a campaign centered on solutions rather than drama.”
He reinforced that approach by returning to his central message.
“We have to be better at how we plan, how we communicate, and how we execute,” Nesta said, emphasizing that his campaign was about improving how the city functions rather than engaging in personal disputes.
The contrast between the candidates ultimately sharpened around two different arguments.
Moore emphasized experience, relationships, and leadership tone. She raised over $100,000, knocked on doors throughout Apopka, and did the things winning candidates do. It was, however, the wrong political environment for her message.
Nesta emphasized execution, systems, and how the city functions day-to-day.
By the time of the runoff, many voters had already chosen between those two approaches.
The outcome reflects a convergence of factors rather than a single decisive moment. A shifting electorate, a message that matched voter experience, a general election that disrupted traditional expectations, a runoff that reinforced rather than reset the race, and a series of attacks that failed to redirect voter focus all contributed to the result.
Nesta’s victory can be understood as the product of positioning rather than momentum. He did not rely on a late surge in support, but instead built a campaign that aligned with changes already underway and maintained that alignment through both rounds of voting.
Nesta didn’t raise much money and faced two of Northwest Orange County’s most established politicians, but he stayed on message, remained disciplined, and appeared largely bulletproof in the face of attacks, never engaging them directly while winning his third straight election with 60% of the vote or more in 2022, 2024, and 2026.
No Apopka candidate in the post-John Land era has accomplished that.
Like Gretzky, Nesta did not chase where the puck had been. He positioned himself where it was going.
And with the electorate already there, the outcome followed.
