May 29, 2019 at 12:40 p.m.
Mayo: Kowalski, Kraemer overcome differences to lead Hodag track back to state
Mayo: Kowalski, Kraemer overcome differences to lead Hodag track back to state
"We've come along way since sophomore year," Kraemer said last Thursday at sectionals. "There's a story behind that, but we'll wait 'til state to tell that story."
It's a story about how the success of this year's RHS track team - winning a conference championship, breaking school records and qualifying for the state meet - almost didn't happen.
Those results did not seem conceivable two years ago after Kowalski quit the track team following a falling out with Kraemer.
It took a meeting of minds, a bit of swallowed pride from both coach and athlete, and mutual respect slowly rebuilt between the two to reach this point.
Respect is not the first word that would have been used two years ago to describe their relationship. Kowalski was a talented but temperamental sophomore.
"My freshman year I had a really good, amazing team," Kowalski explained. "I had Eric Tracy. I had Alec Bess. I had Logan Freund. I had all those guys. I had very high-level athletes and to work with them and be able to do what I wanted to do was very nice."
Heading into Kowalski's sophomore year Kraemer, still an assistant coach under Chris Ferge, took a more active role coaching the sprinters, after focusing primarily on the hurdlers in his first couple of years on staff.
Kraemer had ideas of how to make the sprinters better. Kowalski wasn't buying it.
"Looking back on it I thought it was the best decision then but it probably wasn't," Kraemer said. "We were asking them to do 100-meter buildups before meets and it wasn't helping their form. They weren't staying motivated in it."
Kowalski was one of the athletes struggling to stay motivated. One day at practice, after dogging one of Kraemer's workouts, Kowalski got called out by his coach. The two had a heated exchange that ended with Kraemer kicking Kowalski out of practice and telling him not to return until he had a better attitude.
"I quit, didn't come back," Kowalski said, admitting he was hard-headed and stubborn at the time.
That fall, Kowalski switched sports leaving football, where Kraemer was an assistant at the time, and joining boys' soccer instead. It could easily have been an opportunity lost due to a frayed player-coach relationship.
However, Kraemer did not give up. The following spring, now the head coach of the track program, Kraemer reached out to Kowalski looking to mend fences.
"I said, 'Let me build the trust back with you. I know that we have our differences and problems, but let me build that trust,'" he said.
With Kowalski back in the fold, the give and take in the relationship with Kraemer began to develop. The trust factor followed suit.
"We found a solid middle ground and found that I could trust him and he could trust me," Kowalski said. "We figured out what we needed to do with the team, and what we needed to do with my stubbornness."
The results began to show last year and led to a breakthrough at the GNC meet in the 4x100 relay. Kowalski, along with teammates Nick Kriesel, Josh Francisco and AJ Kopplin - the same four who will run in the event for Rhinelander this weekend in La Crosse - won the event by more than a second and finished fifth in a tough Division 1 regional that included all of the Wisconsin Valley Conference.
Another key moment in the relationship between Kraemer and Kowalski took place at the end of the team's first practice back in March. The two had a long conversation about the direction the team should take this season. Kowalski wanted to make an all-in push in his senior year, taking the team's dedication to training to new heights. Kraemer, keeping in mind the long-term vision of the program, wanted to start a little slower - especially given the high number of freshmen on the team.
Both left that conversation feeling like they got what they wanted.
"I don't think he was ready to push all those kids, but we got some guys together," Kowalski said. "Me being the stubborn one, the punk, went to go and talk to him, and he realized that we could push these kids."
"All the seniors wanted to be pushed a little harder and I just told them (to) trust the process," Kraemer said. "I have an idea. We have to make sure we have the foundation set for these freshmen. If we push them too hard early, the freshmen won't understand our vision and not want to come back. Ultimately, that's where you work the hardest as that were you want to grow.
"I gave the seniors an opportunity to make decisions about our team. It was at that point, when he knew I had his best interests in mind and I was willing to listen to him and take in all of his concerns and take my coaching philosophy and kind of shape it toward what they wanted as their experience, that's when he stated to believe in what we were doing."
The rest is RHS track history. The Hodags broke school records in the 4x100 and 4x200, with Kowalski running the anchor leg both times. That was followed by the team's first conference title in 52 years, a regional championship and, now, both sprint relays ready to make their way to La Crosse for the state meet.
Indeed, Kowalski and Kraemer have come a long way from where they were two years ago.
"We've gained that mutual respect for each other and I really enjoy coaching him," Kraemer said. "I love him. He's a great kid and to say he's grown on me would be an understatement."
"Kraemer could tell me to do almost anything now and I'd do it because I trust him," Kowalski said. "The relationship is beyond what it used to be and I think that's why he got, and deserved, (GNC) coach of the year. He's such an amazing coach."
Their journey together will conclude this weekend in La Crosse.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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