With the cancellation of the venerable Kansas Relays after 103 years, several Kansas and Kansas City-area meets cropped up to try and fill the void, but none more emphatically made the case as the heir apparent than the RunningLane Kansas City Relays in terms of quality, depth, and size.
The handoff and nod to KU Relays tradition even included KU legend and KU Relays regular Jim Ryun, one of the greatest U.S. milers in history, starting the championship miles just like he did for decades at the Kansas Relays. Between the free live stream on YouTube, sparkler pots, outstanding fields, and smooth transition to fit a two-day meet into one day following the weather cancellation on Friday, it would appear that the KU Relays have found a more than worthy successor.
"After consulting with multiple Kansas City area knowledgeable coaches, we made the decision to move the meet over the state line to Missouri so the meet would be in a position to grow into a larger regional and even national presence," said RunningLane cofounder Sean Allan. "Kansas has a rule for high school athletes that they cannot compete further than 500 miles from the Kansas border," said Allan. "But the rule also works in reverse, meaning that athletes further than 500 miles from the Kansas border cannot come into Kansas to compete. With the cancellation of the KU Relays, we decided this moment provided an opportunity to pivot to a meet on the traditional KU Relays spot on the calendar, the third weekend in April, to something even bigger and better for the athletes and fans," Allan said. "I'd be lying if I said our goal wasn't to become the Arcadia of the Midwest," laughed Allan. "But it may take us a few years to get there."
Due to violent storms on Friday, which included tornado sirens going off near the host site at Blue Springs South High School, Friday events were canceled. The RunningLane crew created a new schedule to preserve all the events and shoehorn the two-day meet into one day on Saturday. "We had too many athletes who had come from too far away to let them down by not letting them compete," said Allan. "We were absolutely determined to fit this meet into one day on a schedule that would preserve the ability of athletes competing in multiple events to still compete in all of those events. Failure was not an option. We used every tool at our disposal, including AI, to help create a schedule that met that criteria and fit everything into one day and we were thrilled to pull it off," said Allan.
The numbers tell the story:
* 214 MileSplit Elite performances.
* 90 Kansas & Missouri top-ten marks (26 Kansas, 64 Missouri)
* 19 U.S. Top-50 marks
The most anticipated race of the meet was the boys Jim Ryun Championship Mile, headlined by Arkansas's Brian Burns, who brought a 4:00.09 PR to the party. The stadium lights shut off for the dramatic athlete intros while the pace lights zipped around the track in reverse and the sparkler pots ignited with each introduction. The sub-4:00 was not to be, but Burns still managed a sterling 4:06.06. In terms of U.S. top-50 marks, the boys 4x1600 was king. Three U.S. top-50 marks were achieved by Bentonville (AR) (U.S. #12), Park Hill South (MO) (U.S. #16) and Blue Valley Southwest (KS) (U.S. #26). Park Hill South's team of Simon Ketter, David Meyer, Grant Windmeyer, and Thomas Garrett shattered the Missouri state record with their time of 17:41.00. Garrett anchored the team with a 4:14 split shortly after winning the elite 3200m race in a new personal best and MO #7 time of 9:06.30.
Fresh off her sterling 9:59.64 3200 at Arcadia, Providence Classical Christian Academy's Gabbie Bishop shut down the Jim Ryun Girl's Mile with a blistering 65-second last lap, winning the inaugural event with a time of 4:52.32.
In the field, U.S. top-50 marks were put up in the girls javelin by Paige Stanfield (Shawnee Mission East) (44.04m/144-06) and AnnaJo Hill (Helias Catholic) (42.70m/140-01), in the boys javelin by Kole Schaunaman (Piper) (59.72m/195-11), and high jump by Logan Sandmann (Axtell) (2.05m/6-09).
Photo: Chris Auckley
But the clear MVP of the meet had to be Isla Alfultis of Helias Catholic. She notched not one, not two, not three, but FOUR impressive wins in the 100 (11.69, MO #1, U.S. #83), 200 (24.49, MO #1), 100mH (14.78), and 300mH (42.93, MO #1, U.S. #38). Her 40 points contributed to a runaway team victory by Helias who finished with 123 points followed by Liberty (77) and St. Teresa's Academy (70). The boys team title was captured by Lee's Summit West with 121, followed by Creighton Preparatory Academy (92) and Bentonville (49).
