The 102nd edition of the Kansas Relays is in the books and even though the weather was less than ideal, the meet still proved to be one of the best yet. Cold and rain provided challenges, as well as an rain delay early on Friday morning, but even still, the athletes at the Kansas Relays brought the heat.
Full Results
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By The Numbers...
On the track and in the field at Rock Chalk Park, there were...
506 MileSplit Elite Performances
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Hitting the Highlights
Bentonville Boys Put On A Show
The Bentonville (AR) High School boys travelled up to Kansas and put on a show unlike the Relays have seen from a team in a long while. After showing this indoor season that they have one of the strongest distance squads in the Midwest, and arguably the country, the Tigers put together a weekend to remember in Lawrence.
They started their weekend with a victory in the 4x1600 meter relay. The team of Carter Beasley, Owen Kelley, Matthew Shelly, and Logan Hurley ran 17:33.82 to pick up the 18-second win over Blue Valley Southwest. With an average time of 4:23, they moved up to US No. 13 in the event with the fastest time outside of California so far this season. Further, it bested their 2024 meet record by 9 seconds.
The Tigers had three athletes in the 3200 meter run later that afternoon, with Kelley, Tishan Abeyagunawardene, and Sean Burns all taking a turn in their first open events of the weekend. Kelley would come across third overall in 9:06.01, just off the 9:00.50 outdoor personal best he posted earlier this spring. This winter, he broke 9:00 twice and has come close to doing it again outdoor twice already, as well. Abeyagunawardene posted a personal best of 9:17.19, earning 10th overall, and Burns was the top (and only) freshman in the race with his 9:40.19 mark for 21st. It was 7 seconds off his 9:33.83 US No. 27 mark among freshmen.
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The Distance Medley brought another meet record for the boys as they nearly cleared 10:00 and dominated from start to finish. The team of Brian Burns, Qwentin Luginbill, Harper Jones, and Shelly, posted the second fastest time in the country and broke their 2024 meet record by 13 seconds. Burns split 3:03.29 on the 1200 leg before Luginbill ran 50.00 on the 400 leg and Jones ran 1:53.34 on the 800 leg, all leading up to a 4:13.92 anchor leg from Shelly.
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The 800 was the first of two open events Bentonville athletes would win as Carter Beasley took the tape in the half-mile in 1:52.44, just under a second behind Olympian Leo Manzano's 2003 meet record. An all-conditions personal best, Beasley is now US No. 41 in the event. Beasley's teammate Logan Hurley was just behind his personal best in 1:58.48 in Heat 1.
The sprinters got in on the action on Day 2, opening up Saturday's action with a victory in the 1600m Sprint Medley. The team of Mason Hawkins, Kayden Brown, Luginbill, and Ryan Fernstrom ran 3:34.93 to hold off West Holt (NE). Brown also participated in the 100 meter dash, running 10.90 (+2.6), as well as the 9th place 4x100m relay (42.28). Luginbill finished 23rd in the 400 meter dash in 50.72, a second off his personal best. Fernstrom was also about a second off his 300 meter hurdles best in 40.44.
The highlight of the day, arguably, for the Tigers was their 4x800 victory. The team of Beasley, Shelly, Kelley, and Brian Burns dominated the race, running away from the 20th best team in the country - Rockhurst - to win by 15 seconds and shatter a 60-year-old meet record held by the legendary Jim Ryun and crew. Ryun was on hand to congratulate the team on their epic feat. Their 7:39.77 mark broke his record by 3 seconds and stands as the fourth fastest time in the country and, once again, the fastest time run outside of California. Their splits were 1:55.33, 1:54.57, 1:55.70, and 1:54.19 from Burns who was solo on the anchor, nearly 100 meters ahead of the rest of the field.
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Bentonville capped off their day with six athletes in the 1600 meter run and ended up with three of them in the top eleven. Matthew Shelly pulled off the afore-mentioned second individual victory of the weekend with his 4:08.74 victory, taking down former York (IL) standout Matt Plowman's 4:11.43 from 2015. Shelly closed in 58.44 on his final lap for the win and a US No. 17 mark over Shawnee Mission South's Max Larson. Kelley and Beasley came across virtually in tandem in tenth and eleventh, running 4:16.60 and 4:16.64, respectively, in different heats. Abeyagunawardene, Hurley, and Sean Burns were 39th, 40th, and 41st with 4:32.64, 4:33.73, and 4:34.34 marks, a personal best for Burns only.
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In the field, their lone non-track competitor Will Neumann added a 56-0.75 mark in the shot put for sixth overall, second best in Arkansas so far.
An incredible weekend for the Bentonville Tigers, they won four relays and two individual events, posted two top-five national marks, rewrote four meet records, and truly had the best team performance of anyone throughout the weekend.
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