* MileSplit spoke with Logan St. John Kletter after her State Record Run.
By: Phil Grove
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PHILADELPHIA, Pa. - It was crystal clear to Mt. Lebanon standout Logan St. John Kletter.
For her final high school race to be a perfect 10, it needed to be a 9. Nine as in 9 minutes and ... the rest really didn't matter.
The University of North Carolina signee left nothing to chance today, breaking a New Balance National Outdoors meet record and Pennsylvania state record with her 2-mile run winning time of 9:58.44 at historic Franklin Field in Philadelphia.
"I am super proud of the performance," St. John Kletter said, having surpassed the PA record 10:04.51 by Mia Cochran in 2022 and the year-old meet mark of 10:02.08. "Ali Ince was the pacer, and she did a great job of leading the first mile so I really didn't have to do any thinking and just sat behind her and (eventual runner-up Ava Jarrell of Indiana). When (Ali) stepped off, I took the lead from there."
A pair of 73.6-second laps put St. John Kletter in front and just under 5 minutes at the mile. Averaging 75 seconds for each of the next three laps had the recent Mt. Lebanon graduate a strong kick from another dominating performance and a goal achieved.
"I was seeing every lap how I was going to be right around the 10-minute mark so I was just giving everything I had to get under it," she said. "It has been a dream for a long time to run in the 9 minutes, so to do it in my last high school race, and to have a national title come along with it, is just surreal."
Today's HS finale for St. John Kletter was her third national-caliber race in just over two weeks, and her St. Louis-Seattle-Philadelphia circuit started just days after she successfully defended her PIAA title at 3,200 and added a 1,600 win for good measure. Stormy weather Friday night in Philadelphia forced the 2-mile races to this morning and gave St. John Kletter some much-needed rest.
"I was feeling tired yesterday so I'm happy the storms pushed it to this morning," she said of the race she won by almost 13 seconds. "That gave me an extra night to recover from Brooks (PR). It was a lot of traveling in a short amount of time ... but also a lot of fun."
In addition to owning the 2M state record, St. John Kletter also set the 1,600 record of 4:35.86 en route during the HOKA mile in St. Louis. She also narrowly missed the mile, 3,000 and 3,200 all-time marks for Pennsylvania high schoolers.
