For the last 77 years, Wichita State’s cross country team’s home meet has held strong. What’s now known as the JK Gold Classic was named after longtime WSU head coach John Kornelson, who coached the Shockers from 1978 to 2000.
Steve Rainbolt, the current director of track and field, gave the meet its name in 2001 to honor Kornelson. Head cross country coach Kirk Hunter described Kornelson as a “wonderful guy.”
Before moving to its new home at LW Clapp Park in 2023, the meet was held at the 4 Mile Creek Resort in Augusta, Kansas.
“(Clapp is) definitely something that’s a destination place,” Hunter said. “It seems the teams really like the course.”
WSU has claimed a combined 33 team titles in both the men’s and women’s races, including six-straight on the men’s side from 2012-17. Twenty-five different Shockers earned the individual champion title, and Tjaart Van Niewenhuizen won three consecutive titles from 1987-89.
Hunter was the mind behind the design and layout of the new course once the meet shifted to Clapp. He also works on maintenance and lawn upkeep during the summer and off-season.
Hunter said he was asked to design the current track four years ago. It took a year for him to fully develop it, and has been the place the Shockers have called home since 2023.
Two main aspects Hunter took into consideration while designing the course were the enjoyment of the runners and the spectators.
“You want to have a course that the runners enjoy,” Hunter said. “Give them a bit of variety here and there, make the runners enjoy it. There’s a tree line we run through the middle of, they love that. The second thing is the spectators, I literally had the course done at one point, and I changed it — pretty significant change, simply because I was thinking about what if there was somebody who was handicapped, and how much could they see. I added another 20 or 25% of course that they could see.”
The course at Clapp is very visible, and spectators can line the course, which is a boost in morale to the runners.
“Hearing people cheer for you and things like that … it helps amazingly in terms of improving your performance and making you do better,” Hunter said.
The JK Gold Classic is also one of the few opportunities local spectators will get to see the WSU team in uniform and running.
“This is the opener for our team,” Hunter said. “There’s a majority of our team going to be in uniform.”
Wichita State cross country will compete at its home JK Gold Classic meet on Sept. 6. It’s a combination of both high school and collegiate teams, with approximately 1,000 competitors, according to Hunter.
