JJ Williams, GC boys’ 4×400 relay lay claim to state track championships

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LA CROSSE — Neither sweltering heat and stifling humidity nor the competition were about to keep these Glenwood City athletes from achieving their goals and dreams.

Seniors JJ Williams, Wyatt Thompson and Brady Klatt and freshman Brady Thompson dared to dream big and worked hard to make it a reality.

Last Saturday, June 3, the second and final day of competition of the 2023 WIAA State Track and Field Championships which were held at the Veterans Memorial Field Complex on the scenic UW-La Crosse campus, saw the Glenwood City boys track and field team claim not one but two state titles in record-setting fashion.

Senior JJ Williams capped his storied prep running career at Glenwood City High School with a dominating run to the state title in the Division 3, 800 meters.

A little more than an hour later, Williams along with Brady Klatt, and Wyatt and Brady Thompson crushed their school’s record and exceeded expectations and rankings to win state gold in the 4×400 meter relay.

That pair of podium-topping wins, coupled with a bronze-medal performance by the 4×800 meter relay team, which included Williams, the Thompson brothers and Ilan Anderson, the previous day and senior Blake Wakeling’s fourth-place finish in the pole vault had the Hilltoppers in the hunt for a team trophy until the conclusion of this year’s state meet. Ultimately, the Glenwood City boys finished in a three-way tie with Iola-Scandinavia and Eau Claire Regis for third place in the final Division 3 team standings with 31 points, just a single point behind state runner-up Athens and seven points in back of the champions from Shiocton.

The top six finishers in each event earned medals and made the awards podium while first through eighth earned team points.

In her second straight state appearance, junior Haylie Hannah, the Topper girls’ lone representative in La Crosse this year, earned the moniker of state runner-up in the D3 pole vault where she equaled her own school-record jump of 10 feet 6 inches. The eight team points that Hannah earned for her second-place finish put Glenwood City in a tie for 31st place in the final Division 3 girls’ team standings which was topped by Fall Creek with 55 points. Lancaster and Chequamegon finished in second with 28 points.

After finishing second in the 800 meter state final a year ago, JJ Williams’ focus has been on capping his senior season with a win in his specialty race.

He did just that, dominating the two-lap race from start to finish.

Williams burned passed the competition with a torrid 55 second first lap and continued to push the pace during the second and final lap of Saturday’s Division 3, 800 meter final. When he crossed the finish line, nearly ten meters and three seconds ahead of his

nearest competitor, Williams lifted both arms into the air to celebrate his win.

The clock showed that Williams had run a winning time of 1:51.97, a new state record eclipsing the previous mark of 1:54.29 set just a year ago by Durand-Arkansaw graduate and current Boston University athlete Parker Schneider, who ironically was on hand to witness and congratulate Williams.

“This is a very emotional moment, it may sound pretty cliche, but this is a dream come true for me and my whole family who has had unwavering support for me throughout my whole career. And coming here and breaking a state record by, I think, over two seconds is very surreal,” said a nearly breathless Williams following his 800 meter state title run

“I knew I had to go out strong if I wanted the state record,” acknowledged Williams. “I was a little tired from yesterday, I had the 4×800 and 4×400 prelims but I felt pretty good through the first 400 and then I kicked it down.”

“It was definitely my goal since last year when I lost to Parker, I got second here last year, so it was definitely my goal and 365 days later I did it,” concluded Williams.

One of the senior’s co-head coaches, Ron Hanestad, praised his effort.

“JJ Williams ran a lights-out performance in the 800 meter run,” stated Coach Hanestad. 

“His goal was to win the event and also break the state record.  His work in the off season really paid off as he was able to not only win the event, but smash the state record in the process.  He beat the Division 3 state record by over two seconds, ran faster than the current Division 2 state record, and just missed running the fastest 800 ever at the state track meet in all divisions by only about a half second. This was a dominant performance, period,” added Hanestad.

The day, however, wasn’t over for Williams. With little more than an hour respite, he and teammates Brady Klatt and Wyatt and Brady Thompson made their way down the track in preparation for the state meet’s final race, its premier race, the 4×400 meter relay.

Glenwood City had finished second to Webster in Friday’s prelims.

Brady Klatt started the race off for Glenwood City. When he handed the baton to Williams for the second leg, there were a handful of runners ahead of the Hilltoppers. But, within half a lap Williams had sped past all of them and went about building a substantial advantage before the baton was handed to Wyatt Thompson and finally Brady Thompson who both maintained that large cushion.

Glenwood City won the race in 3:25.81 nearly four seconds ahead of second-place Webster and had beaten the school record of 3:27.16 by a second and a half.

“Just as dominating as JJ’s run in the 800 was this year’s 4×400 team,” said Hanestad. “Last year’s team just narrowly missed the state title by finishing second.  With three members returning from the team that ran at state (JJ Williams, Wyatt Thompson, and Brady Klatt) along with both of our alternates from last year in seniors Cody Hansen and Elek Anderson, put that together with freshman Brady Thompson running very similar performances to his brother Wyatt, and the 4×400 team dominated the race by breaking the school record.”

“Our plan in the race was to run JJ in second, get the lead and never look back.  Brady Klatt gave us a solid start, then JJ looked like the flash when he got the baton and was able to put us in the driver’s seat with a 2-3 exchange in lane 1,” stated Hanestad. “From there, brothers Wyatt and Brady Thompson both ran their personal best splits to pull away and win the event by just under 4 seconds.  This was a truly dominant performance.”

Williams and the Thompson brothers also played integral roles in the boys’ 4×800 meter relay on Friday morning. The trio joined by sophomore Ilan Anderson ran a 9:09.54, another school record, to finish third.

After finishing sixth in last year’s D3 girls’ state pole vault competition, junior Haylie Hannah palced second in Friday morning’s competition with a jump of 10 feet 6 inches.   

“I just love the family that pole vault has,” Hannah said. “Today was so great with all of us competitors just cheering each other on, getting to know each others names and who we are and becoming a family.”

“Second was my goal, second or third but my real goal was to get 10’ 9” and I tried reaching for it but it was a really hot day and blew through a bunch of poles,”  she added.

“Next year, I would definitely like to get 11 (feet) and get up on the podium again, first would be great,” said Hannah with a laugh and smile.

Her male vaulting counterpart, senior Blake Wakeling finished fourth in his first and only state competition. Wakeling cleared 12’, 12’ 6” and 13’ on his first jump attempts before being eliminated with three consecutive misses at 13’ 6”, a height he cleared at the sectional meet.

“Blake Wakeling had an excellent performance at the state meet by clearing a height of 13’.  This came on a day when several vaulters were having difficulty with the temperatures on the track and the vaulters struggling with their poles not behaving as they did earlier in the season with cooler temperatures,” said Hanestad.

Glenwood City’s final state competitor was junior Conner Gross who placed 14th in the D3 shot put with a best throw of 45’ 3.25”.

“Conner Gross came into this track season and if you would have told him that he was going to throw 45’ 3.25” and take 14th place at the state meet, he wouldn’t have believed you,” stated Hanestad. “Conner had a monster throw of 48’3” to get him to the state meet, but just wasn’t able to reproduce the monster throw from sectionals.”