Kraft, True, Gilliland earn 1A state medals

WICHITA — Finishing his track career with two state meet medals is all right with Southern Coffey County High senior Colin Kraft.
Kraft got the job done Friday morning in the preliminaries of the Kansas Class 1A 110-meter high hurdles and the 300-meter intermediate hurdles. That put him in Saturday’s finals for both events.
“I had a slow start. I was the last one over the first hurdle,” Kraft said as he went through the 110-meter high hurdle final. “I sped up then a kid next to me hit a hurdle and that motivated me even more to pass the rest.”
Kraft passed all but one competitor and captured the silver medal, running the race in 15.44 seconds. He had run the race in 15.60 seconds in the preliminaries.
“It feels pretty good to get the silver medal because I really figured I’d take fourth or fifth in the race,” Kraft said. Kraft was seventh in the 110-meter high hurdles a year ago.
Then came the 300-meter intermediates.
“That was a terrible race. I started even slower and I didn’t kick it in when I needed to and lost to kids I shouldn’t have. But a fifth-place medal is a state medal and I’ll take it. It’s good to finish the season at the state meet and get two medals,” Kraft said.
Kraft ran the 300-meter intermediate hurdles in 40.28 seconds, which was better than his 40.77 preliminary time. A year ago, Kraft missed the finals for the 300s by one place, his preliminary time was ninth fastest. He was the Lyon County League champion in both hurdle events.
Southern Coffey County senior Ryan True made a statement right off the bat in the 1A javelin event Friday at the state meet. His first throw of the event went 167 feet. He wasn’t able to improve on it but it stood up to claim the fourth-place medal plus it was a SCCH boys’ javelin throw record.
“My goal all season was to break the school record. The first meet of the season I threw 160 but after that it was in the 150s and 140s,” True said. “I really gave it all I had that first throw at state.
“I felt pretty good accomplishing what I set out to and getting a state medal.”
Last year, True was at the state in the javelin event missing the medals by one place, finishing eighth. He said he felt good going into the finals Friday but just “never had the energy” to extend his distance.
True said the old SCCH boys’ javelin mark was 166’11”.
Crest High’s Kurston Gilliland was another two-medal competitor in Class 1A.
Gilliland won the bronze medal in the girls’ shot put event Friday. She was in fifth or sixth going into the finals with a throw of 35 feet, 13⁄4 inches. On her second throw of the finals, she put the shot out at 37’21⁄2”.
“It was pretty intense,” Gilliland said of the shot put competition. “When I threw the 37, I really felt good about it. To take third is really great after last year (she was 10th at state as a freshman).”
Gilliland landed in third by a fourth of an inch as second place was 37’23⁄4”. The sophomore returned Saturday to capture the seventh-place medal in the 1A girls’ javelin with a throw of 119’11”.
“It wasn’t my personal best but it was a good throw. It felt good to be on the (medal) stand for a second time,” Gilliland said.
Also in Class 1A, Crest’s Jordan Morton, a sophomore, was 12th in the boys’ javelin with a throw of 145’7”. Junior Jayden Bowen placed 15th in the discus with a toss of 122’2” but failed to get a legal throw in during the 1A boys’ shot put event. Crest senior Dakota Ramsey did not compete in the javelin after qualifying for the state meet.
Southern Coffey County’s sophomore Sarah Webb equaled her best of 4’10” in the 1A girls’ high jump, placing 10th. Junior Ashton Isch finished 14th in the triple jump with a leap of 32’61⁄2”.
Junior Jenna Witteman ran in the 200-meter preliminaries on Friday, posting a time of 28.16 seconds, and ran in the 100-meter preliminaries Saturday morning, in 13.82 seconds. Witteman did not advance to the finals in either event.