The indoor track season doesn’t start until January, but the team is already conditioning in hopes of sending more athletes to the national tournament than the five it sent last year.
“This is the fastest team, most athletic team and a team that gets along well with one another,” head coach Rob Mallinder said. “I think all those attributes are going to make it a special year.”
Mallinder said the recruiting class of this year will contribute a lot to the success of the team.
“I feel that this is the best track recruiting class, period,” he said. “We have a good mixture of returning national participants and an extremely strong incoming class with a lot of high school state experience.”
Leaders like seniors Brent Randle and Matt Kmiec have emerged on the team to provide guidance to the strong yet unrefined freshman class. Instead of being vocal and pressuring the underclassmen to attain early success, both athletes said they try to indirectly influence them.
“I try and lead by example,” Randle said.
Kmiec said the leaders on the team are stepping up to show the incoming recruits what the track program at Baker University is all about.
“This team seems to have bought into the system more. This team, since it’s young and impressionable, has a lot of potential,” Kmiec said. “The upperclassmen are doing a good job of motivating the underclassmen to realize their potential.”
Randle said track programs and coaches at the university level may be something freshman athletes have to get used to.
“It’s a different coaching philosophy than probably what their coaches did in high school,” Randle said. “I think when they start working in our system and see their potential, it will just click for them. At the beginning it’s kind of frustrating.”
Freshman Stephen Larkins, a multi-event athlete, said college is a big change for a track athlete coming out of high school.
“No one really cares about track in high school, but the coaches here go a lot out of their way to help you,” he said. “They expect a lot more out of you.”
Larkins said he looks up to the athletes who work hard and have proved themselves already.
“If you look at their times that they had to run to get to nationals, I respect them for that,” he said.
Randle, senior LaTasha Roberts and sophomore Katey Wegemer qualified for last year’s national meet located in Johnson City, Tenn. Roberts competed in the 60-meter dash, Wegemer in the 600-meter run and Randle competed in the triple jump in which he took third place.
Even though he is one of the few on the team to have made it to the national level, Randle said he isn’t any different than the other athletes.
“My place on the team is just like anybody else,” he said. “(That is to) do my part to score some points and win championships.”
The incoming freshmen’s credentials include two of the top four 300-meter hurdlers coming out of Kansas high schools this year, a Missouri class 1A state record-holder, a Kansas state champion, a Missouri sectional champion and six Missouri district champions, Mallinder said.
This high-caliber recruiting class was the product of a different recruiting strategy by Mallinder. Instead of a wide-sweeping search, he said he and assistant coach Mackie Valentin focused on a select few.
“When you spend the time necessary to watch, evaluate and form a relationship with a high school athlete, it makes a big difference,” Mallinder said.