Behind Eisenhower’s dramatic relay state track title and how it almost didn’t happen
In the minutes before Makenzie Block pulled off one of the best comebacks at the Kansas high school state track and field meet to win gold for the Eisenhower girls 400-meter relay team, the relay team wasn’t even sure if they would be running together.
That’s because less than an hour before they stepped on the track on Saturday for the Class 5A finals, their first leg of the race was not even at Cessna Stadium.
She was eight miles away at Stryker Complex playing in the final soccer game of her illustrious career, a 1-0 victory for Eisenhower over Maize South in the third-place game of the Class 5A state tournament.
A little after 2 p.m. on Saturday, about 45 minutes before the start of the girls 400-meter relays, Abby Bachman had taken the last picture with her soccer teammates, rushed to her parent’s car and was flying down K-96 headed for Cessna Stadium.
“That was definitely the most nerve-wracking car ride I’ve ever been on,” Bachman said.
She scarfed down a sandwich and changed into her track uniform in the car, as her parents pulled into the Cessna Stadium parking lot with time to spare.
But that wasn’t the end of the journey for Bachman, who still needed time for a trainer to cut the tape on her ankles for the soccer game and apply a new tape job to cover the blisters on her feet from playing in an 80-minute soccer game in 85-degree heat.
“I was confident she was going to make it, but our girls weren’t OK until they saw her walk in,” Eisenhower track and field coach Stephanie Bush said. “Because you just don’t know with soccer, if they go to overtime, go to penalties, how long it was going to go. The girls were sweating it.”
Bachman estimated she had 10 minutes — nowhere close to enough time to complete her typical routine — to finish an abbreviated warm-up routine, focused mostly on stretching and hand-offs with Harli Omli, the team’s second leg.
No matter how rushed she was, Bachman’s presence alone lifted the spirits of her relay members. While Eisenhower had an alternate ready to go, Bachman, a senior, was entrusted with the start of the relay for a reason: she was as reliable as they come.
“My body definitely felt exhausted, but I told myself I only have to run for 12 more seconds and it’s going to be over,” Bachman said. “I was so busy running around, I didn’t really have time to think about anything really. When I was in the blocks, I wasn’t nervous at all, which is weird.”
Bachman, Omli and Mackenzie Popp all delivered solid legs, but when Block received the baton for the anchor leg, Eisenhower was in fourth place in the race and a couple strides behind the leaders.
Block had never been in this position before, as Eisenhower had won just about every 400-meter relay race and entered with Friday’s fastest qualifying time.
“When we were behind, I’ll be honest, I did freak out a little bit,” Block said. “I knew there was a lot of pressure because we had talked so much about winning it. So I literally just went for it and ran my hardest.”
Block was still in fourth place rounding the final curve, but she steadily closed the ground between the leaders from Shawnee Heights and Great Bend. She said she felt herself gaining strength with each runner she passed.
With 20 meters to go, Block had pulled level with the lead pack. Watching from the stands, Bush wasn’t surprised to see Block ascend to a new level in chase-down mode.
“I knew she had fight in her and she was not going to go down like that,” Bush said. “There was absolutely no way.”
When the race boiled down to a battle of wills in the final stretch, Block would not be denied. Each one of her long strides pulled her inches further away and closer to a championship and with one last lunge toward the finish line, she cemented a legacy.
Block had not only engineered the dramatic come-from-behind victory, but she had delivered Eisenhower its first relay championship in school history with a school record-breaking time of 49.44 seconds.
“It was just instant happiness,” Block said. “I don’t even know the words to describe what I felt. Honestly, it was just a huge relief because we had talked so many times about winning and I didn’t want to let my teammates down. I was just over-the-moon excited.”
Block’s teammates swarmed her near the finish line, celebrating their new reality as state champions.
There were so many things that could have altered the outcome and prevented the four runners from competing together at the state meet. What if the Class 5A state soccer tournament was anywhere other than Wichita? What if Eisenhower would have played in the championship game on Saturday rather than the third-place game?
How everything perfectly aligned for Eisenhower to pull off the victory made the thrill of it even more heightened.
“This is definitely going to be something I’ll remember forever,” Bachman said. “I’m so thankful Makenzie is our anchor. That just shows how amazing of a runner she is. When she has someone in front of her, she’s going to run them down. I knew she was going to bring it home for us.”
Block solidified her status as one of the top athletes in Class 5A, as she added three bronze medals in three open events: the 200-meter dash (26.63), 100-meter hurdles (15.74) and 300-meter hurdles (46.68).
While taking third out of Lane 1 in the 200 was quite the accomplishment, the race that Block will cherish forever will be maybe the fastest 100 split of her life to help win the relay title.
“I know you can’t split that, but man, you have to think she was below 12 seconds,” Bush said. “You can always count on her to do something good, but that was more than good. That was incredible, outstanding, unbelievable, you name it.”
.jpg)