WICHITA — Yates Center sophomore Hadley Splechter came to the KSHSAA State Championships on a mission to own the distance events in 2A and one state-meet record and three gold medals later: Mission accomplished.
In the first event of the weekend, Spletcher took the track in the 3200-meter run a little before 8 a.m., on Friday.
Spletcher went into the race as a favorite and left very little doubt with a time of 9:46.82, besting his nearest competitor by 12-seconds to capture his first state championship.
“It feels good,” Splechter said. “I’m glad to get it out of the way, just in case something happens next year. Had to go get it while it was there.”
Splechter wasn’t done there though with three more events waiting.
The sophomore transitioned into team-mode to run gin the final day of the meet with the 4×800-meter relay.
The event gives Splechter a chance to team with juniors Jordan Smith, Colin Bedell and Kobe Forsyth.
Splechter is the top headliner, of course, but Bedell and Smith are each very accomplished runners in their individual events and each earned state medals at this season’s State Cross-Country Championships, but Forsyth has cruised under the radar this season despite being a member of such a dominant relay team.
Forsyth was anything but an afterthought on Saturday though.
“Kobe is phenomenal,” Splechter said. “That is all I have to say about him. With never having run anything over a 400 coming into the season and becoming a state champion, that is impressive.”
After Smith turned in a 2:06 split on his leg and Bedell had a 2:07 split on his, Forsyth got the team back into the race with a 2:04 to close on the leading group and give Splechter a chance.
“All season it has been, just try and give Hadley a chance,” Forsyth said. “To get it at state, I knew I had to make up as much ground as I could.”
Despite Forsyth’s heroics, Spechter still had work left to do as he took the baton in third place, but that was a short-lived dilemma.
“My teammates did their job, so I had to go do mine and finish it for us,” Splechter said. “I was confident that I could run them down. I didn’t know what they had, but I knew what I had.”
Splechter ran a 58.8 on his first lap to move from third to first and the second lap was all about not making it close.
Splechter cruised across the finishline with a final lap 1:02.2 to turn what was a third-place spot into a five-second victory for the Wildcats.
