Ron Keller had nowhere to run on Monday afternoon.
Despite not liking the spotlight, the legendary Durango High School cross country and track and field coach was surrounded. An assembled crowd of current and former athletes and coaches, meet officials and school administrators, plus any number of casual well-wishers soaking up both the sun and the history, paused Durango’s 2025 Ron Keller Invitational.
Keller was honored for decades of hard work, in the trenches and out of the spotlight, and the Durango High School track was named after him.
Flanked by beaming daughter/former DHS standout Kati (Keller) Moore, Keller looked, along with everyone else, above the stadium press box when Viki Thyfault received the command from ground level to unfurl a temporary banner inaugurating The Ron Keller Track.
The Durango High School boys and girls track and field teams did their part in making the day even more special by winning the Ron Keller Invitational.
“It’s just a little overwhelming; I’m not a ‘spotlight’ kind of guy,” Keller said after the ceremony. “I’m a ‘trench’ guy; I like to get in and dig! That’s who I am. I don’t want to be on the front so that was difficult. The big thing is that this was a total surprise … they were working on it for a year and a half! I don’t think they knew it was going to work, but they kept pushing.”
Keller coached the Demons from 1978-2002 and returned in 2020 to coach. He led Durango High School’s cross country and track programs to eight state championships, seven runner-up finishes, and more than 33 team qualifications.
Judging from the number of received handshakes, former pupils and colleagues – and perhaps even some rivals – hadn’t forgotten his longevity and impact, either.
“I’d like to express appreciation for Jerry Martinez and Steve Thyfault, specifically, in terms of the process, vision and execution of the journey that it’s been … to properly celebrate one of Durango’s best coaches,” Durango High School Athletic Director Ryan Knorr said. “He’s a veteran coach that I had heard tales of his legacy. I quickly realized why the legacy was legitimate and how incredibly lucky we were to have him continuing to work with our young people.”
A scholarship has also been created in Keller’s honor with the Durango Education Foundation. Two student-athletes who competed in track and field or cross country will receive the scholarship each year.
The Durango Education Foundation’s Wendy Javier said the foundation is honored to host a scholarship for such a legendary coach and is excited about the deserving scholarship recipients.
On the track, the Demons faced many local schools on a beautiful spring day. The meet was supposed to be on Saturday but was changed to Monday because of the weather.
Even with the change, most schools scheduled to compete on Saturday made it to the meet. Female athletes from 10 schools competed and male athletes from 12 schools competed.
The Durango girls won the girls’ meet with 189 points. Alamosa was second with 90 points and Pagosa Springs was third with 52 points. Montezuma-Cortez was fourth with 51 points and Bayfield was fifth with 38 points.
On the boys’ side, Durango won with 198 points. Pagosa Springs was second with 75 points and Alamosa was third with 59 points. Montezuma-Cortez was fourth with 49 points, Bayfield was fifth with 48 points and Ignacio was sixth with 39 points.
“I call the meet a big success,” Durango track and field head coach Johnny Bertrand said. “The boys and girls teams both won. We dedicated the track to Ron Keller and … that was the big highlight of the meet; there were a lot of good things, but that was a once-in-a-lifetime thing. We’ll probably never rename the track. It's the Ron Keller Track forever … I feel honored that I got to be the head coach when that happened.”
Junior Aileen McManus had a strong day for the Durango girls team, winning the girls 100-meter hurdles in 17.92 seconds and the girls 300 hurdles in 49.51 seconds. Bayfield’s Wrenalee Moore finished third in the 300 hurdles in 50.87. McManus also won the girls triple jump in 32-8.25.
Bertrand said McManus has worked very hard on her triple jump this year and has improved a lot. McManus has been working with coach Evelyn Klein on the second phase of her triple jump. It’s the phase most jumpers have to work on and when an athlete learns how to extend that, they really start improving their distances, according to Bertrand.
McManus’ best event right now is the triple jump; she’s ranked ninth in 4A and is in a great position to qualify for state; the top 18 athletes in each event qualify.
Fellow Durango junior Juliana McKown won the 100 in 13.30 in a super close race with Alamosa’s KayLee Gonzales-Moore finishing second in 13.31 and Bayfield sophomore Vivien Clance finishing third in 13.34.
It was the same top three but in a different order in the girls 200. Gonzales-Moore won in 26.80, Clance was second in 27.20 and McKown was third in 27.29.
Bertrand said there was a lot of wind during the girls 100 and 200 which prevented the girls from putting in any fast times.
Demons sophomore Lacy Ruggiero had a strong performance, winning the girls 1,600 in 5:23.26 and the girls 3,200 in a PR 11:24.58. Ruggiero is in position to qualify for state in both the 1,600 and 3,200.
“She's one of those people who’s going to have to make a decision when we get to state with which events she’s going to run,” Bertrand said about Ruggiero. “But I think she can take off another 10 or 15 seconds on that 3,200 … she works really hard. Sometimes, especially with distance (running), finding good competition really helps push you around the track. When you have somebody better than you running ahead of you, it almost feels like they're pulling you around.”
The Durango girls 4x200 relay team, consisting of senior Ainsley Sampson, freshman Teagan Kroeger, junior Molly Bertrand and McKown won in 1:50.74. It was Kroeger’s first time running the relay and Bertrand hopes to get the team’s time down a few seconds to make sure it qualifies for state.
Clance had a strong showing for Bayfield in the girls high jump, finishing second with a jump of 4-9. Molly Bertrand won the girls long jump with a PR jump of 15-5.25. Johnny Bertrand said his daughter, Molly, was jumping far back on the board and if she moved up, she could’ve possibly jumped over 16 feet.
Durango junior Oshi Reider won the girls shot put with a throw of 34-4.5. Reider is in position to make state for shot put.
On the boys’ side, Durango junior Seb Tripp finished third in the 100 in 11.43 and the 200 in 23.11.
Ignacio sophomore Cayson Burcham had a strong showing, finishing second in the boys 400 in 52.80.
Durango senior Luke Swenk finished second in the boys 1,600 in 4:34.96.
Fellow Durango senior Xavier Sutherlin dominated the boys hurdles; he won the 110 hurdles in 15.20, ahead of Ignacio junior Lincoln deKay in second in 15.98 and Durango sophomore Rashad Reece in third in 16.15.
Sutherlin won the boys 300 hurdles in 41.42 ahead of Reece in second in 42.09 and deKay in third in 42.81. Sutherlin is fourth in 4A in the 110 hurdles and 16th in 4A in the 300 hurdles.
The Demons boys also won the boys 4x100 in 43.38. Sophomore Mason Miller started the relay and handed the baton off to junior Gus Halls. Bertrand said Halls got much stronger in the offseason and his feet have improved.
Halls handed it off to junior Grant Gordon, who tore around the curve looking like Usain Bolt, according to Bertrand. Tripp had the final leg and has been the most consistent sprinter on the team, according to Bertrand.
Durango’s 4x800 relay team also won, finishing in 8:38.54 ahead of Ignacio’s 8:46.73. Demons senior AJ Bonanno, sophomore Jack Purcell, Ben Lively and Swenk worked together for the win.
Bayfield’s Tanner Neeley won the boys high jump with a 6-3 jump. Durango junior Will Zahradnik showed his athleticism, finishing first in the boys long jump at 20-10 and second in the boys triple jump at 41-5.
Gordon easily won the boys pole vault for Durango, with a vault of 12-8. Bayfield junior Kyle Russell finished second at 11-2 and Bayfield junior Zachary Hufnagel finished third at 10-8. Bertrand said Gordon was close to clearing 13 feet.
“You'll see good vaulters in all shapes and sizes, but you do want somebody who's strong; somebody who can’t do a pullup, they're not going to be able to lift themselves up over the bar on the pole,” Bertrand said. “You want someone who’s fast. The more speed you have coming down the runway when you jump, the more power that's going to transfer into getting you over the bar. So, Grant’s speed got a little better last year, but it's gotten a lot better this year.”
Durango juniors Owen Cheatham and Oliver Clark occupied the top of the boys discus and boys shot put standings. Cheatham won the boys discus with a throw of 143-6; Clark was second at 123-0. Clark had the upper hand with shot put at 40-0.5 while Cheatham wasn’t far behind at 39-5.
The Demons will travel to Littleton to compete in the 52nd Liberty Bell Track and Field Invitational on Friday and Saturday. The Demons will compete against at least 40 different schools and will see some top competition from the Denver area.
Ignacio and Bayfield will compete at the Pine River Invitational on Saturday at Bayfield High School.
bkelly@durangoherald.com
