In the contemporary world of college athletics, running tracks in football stadiums are as old-fashioned as the freshman beanie.
Thus Kansas University is considering removing its track from Memorial Stadium and building a free-standing facility.
Not a good idea, says Wes Santee, one of the most decorated runners in KU track and field history.
“I know other schools are doing it,” Santee said Sunday, “but those schools don’t have the tradition of the Kansas Relays.”
Santee, a three-time NCAA champion during his days on Mount Oread in the early 50s, was one of seven Kansas track legends honored at a Sunday afternoon brunch at the Kansas Union.
When Santee was in his hey-day, winning medals and flirting with breaking the four-minute mile, he ran in front of as many as 15,000 fans at the Kansas Relays.
Two decades later, Jim Ryun, another KU track legend, performed in front of more than 30,000 fans at Memorial Stadium.
“What if another Ryun or Santee comes along?” Santee said, noting no separate track facility could accommodate that many people. “There just wouldn’t be the atmosphere of the Kansas Relays out of the stadium.”
Kansas athletics director Bob Frederick addressed the 250 or so former KU track athletes and their families Sunday, telling them: “I can assure you that wherever we build a new track facility it will be a first-class facility.”
Frederick still hasn’t made a decision whether to rebuild the current track in the stadium, or construct another facility either on-campus or somewhere else in Lawrence.
There has been talk of a track-soccer complex on Youth Sports Inc. land in southwest Lawrence, a facility that could be used by both high school and college athletes.
Santee spoke for many of the former KU track athletes when he said: “If they go out to (YSI), that’s no good at all. You would lose tradition, and I would hope they wouldn’t lose that.”
Santee didn’t lose many races in his time. In fact, he was the individual winner of the NCAA cross country championship in 1953 — the only year Kansas has won the team title in the event.
That `53 race covered four miles over a course in East Lansing, Mich. Today’s NCAA championships will be contested over six miles at Rim Rock Farm.
“Rim Rock is more farm- and golf course-like than the one in Michigan,” said Santee, who jogged at Rim Rock on Sunday morning with several former stablemates. “Up there they had an area that was like running down a road. It had some forest, but it was not at all scenic.”
Santee and the others ran about five kilometers of the 6K course.
“The hardest part is in the northwest area,” he said. “There’s a steep hill and that’s where the (covered) bridge is. It’s a beautiful course. It’s hilly enough to test the good distance runner.”
Santee, who operated an insurance agency in Lawrence for many years, is now retired. He spends part of his time in Prescott, Ariz., and the rest in a country house near Eureka in southeast Kansas.
The other legends honored Sunday were Billy Mills, John Lawson, Herb Semper, Al Frame, Ryun and the late Glenn Cunningham.
