Aurora – “I want to put my uniform on one more time,” she said.
Geez, wouldn’t we all?
However, it’s just about official: Katelyn Kaltenbach has lined up for her last race as a Smoky Hill competitor.
“It’s hard to say that,” Kaltenbach said. “I love running for my high school.”
Less than three weeks remain before regional qualifying for track and field’s state meet and Kaltenbach, a senior and one of the nation’s premier distance runners, finds herself relegated to cross-training and running in the pool after an extended break.
Stubbornly holding out hope she can put on a Buffaloes uniform one more time is one thing; getting healthy for her future is another.
“We think it’s best,” said her mother, Kathleen, concerning her younger daughter’s sitting out until college. “We feel right now she needs to take some time off and, unfortunately, the season’s not long enough to get back into it before state.”
Katelyn Kaltenbach suffered a stress fracture near her left heel bone the past fall, eventually developed a back problem as a result of compensating for it and, in retrospect, admittedly returned too fast.
It happens.
Thus ends perhaps the most- extended era of K’s in Colorado since locals followed Nolan Ryan in daily box scores. For six years, a Kaltenbach has ruled in-state distance running here and nearly everywhere else they chose to take a position on the starting line.
First, there was Megan Kaltenbach, who, among other accomplishments, won a record four consecutive big-school cross country championships and 10 in track from 1999-2003. She also won national titles indoors.
Then there was Katelyn, who finished second to Megan by 0.2 of a second in Class 5A cross country as a sophomore in 2002, won as a junior, when she also took the national title, starred at the prestigious Penn Relays and select indoor events, and joined her sister in winning four big-school track titles in the same season (800, 1,600 and 3,200 meters, and as a member of the 3,200 relay).
It was nearly monotonous – the Kaltenbachs ran, and it got to the point that everyone else knew they were relegated to running for second, third if both were entered. Better yet, Katelyn had no trouble playing second fiddle to her sister, took over after Megan graduated and threatened to make even more of an indelible mark nationally.
But instead of Katelyn’s senior season being fulfilled in the area of attaining new heights and capped with, among other goodies, a chance to match Melody Fairchild’s consecutive national titles in the early 1990s, it has been riddled with pain, disappointment, a near-constant trying of her patience, trips to the doctor and assorted rehabilitation. And lots of being idle.
Every serious runner can attest – legs and feet sometimes don’t agree with the constant pounding required to be of national class.
A couple of races into the past cross country season, her stress fracture was discovered. A walking cast and extended rest and cross-training later, she was unable to defend her Colorado championship in October, but managed 15th in the Foot Locker Nationals late in 2004.
Convinced she was healthy enough to continue the ambitious training that took her this far, Kaltenbach ran with her Buffs teammates in the Nike Nationals in Oregon, where she finished fourth individually and paced her team to second.
“Everything felt fine,” she said.
But the back pain she developed when returning from the stress fracture got worse. Kal- tenbach appeared ready to deal with it at the outset of the track season in March, but ended up getting shut down for more than a month.
“I missed training so much,” she said. “I would just come home with nothing to do and I would think, ‘This stinks!’ ”
She did, however, “get to enjoy more of my senior year.” She’s a semi-regular at the school’s baseball games, even some in soccer, a sport she and her sister gave up, ironically, so as not to get hurt.
Plus, she has had more time at home, more mom time and actual extended periods with friends.
And there’s this little thing about being ready for North Carolina’s Tar Heels, where she will join her sister next school year.
“Exactly,” she said. “In talking to Megan (who also had a stress fracture while with the Tar Heels), it’s bad to get hurt, but better to get hurt in high school than college. College is harder to get back.”
Indeed, she said she “did too much too fast,” but Katelyn has no regrets.
“College is the bigger picture,” she said.
Hence, she will probably watch a few of her school’s other spring sports teams and be there when her teammates hit the state meet May 20-21 at Jefferson County Stadium in Lakewood. The Buffs’ boys are two-time defending 5A state champions, and their girls know the distance golds are there for their taking, along with other standouts Maddie McKeever of Heritage and Molly Palmer of Coronado.
Don’t think she’d like to change that. …
“I’d love to,” Kaltenbach said.
