Gazette MVP: No pain, no gain for Brunswick runner Olivia Komperda

Olivia Komperda competed in every event but the 100-meter hurdles, long jump, pole vault, shot put and discus during her illustrious four-year track and field career at Brunswick. The 100, 200, 400, 800, 1,600, 3,200, 300 hurdles, 4x100, 4x2, 4x4, 4x8 and high jump proved to be no problem for the versatile 17-year-old, who qualified for the Division I state meet in the 800 (8th, 2:12.81), 4x4 (6th, 3:53.48) and 4x8 (13th, 9:35.25) as a senior. "And she did it with a partially torn labrum in her (right) hip," Blue Devils assistant coach Kerry Hunter said. "There's your lede right there." For all those reasons, the 5-foot-9, 128-pound Komperda, who will continue her track and cross country careers at Kent State University, has been named Gazette MVP for girls track and field. "There were times when I couldn't even walk normal, but I was still trying to run on it," said Komperda, who had surgery on her hip the Monday after the state meet. "I would run parts of my workout, then go to the trainer's room and finish on the bike. It was a roller coaster. There were times when it was good and times when it was bad." In order to make it to the finish line of her high school career, Komperda relied on low-level painkillers, Tylenol and needling to ease the discomfort that usually surfaced in her lower back and groin. "We're not supposed to have favorites, right? But she's one of my favorites of all time," said Matt Sofranko, who became Brunswick head coach in 2020 and has been with the program for 15 years. "When it comes to track, she's focused more than the average kid. She always comes in and there's no BS. She's definitely a leader on the team." When Komperda was a ninth-grader, her sport of choice was basketball. Long, lean, fast and athletic, she was good enough to play on the junior varsity and dress for varsity games as a freshman. "That was my main sport," she said. "I wanted to focus on that, but then I got a taste of track." In her freshman track season, Komperda was primarily a sprinter, but she also cleared 5 feet in the high jump. She was part of a state-qualifying 4x4 and also reached the regional level in the 4x1 and 4x2. "She's the most diverse athlete I've ever coached," said Hunter, who has coached track for 38 years and cross country for 39. "She could do anything she wanted to. Heck, she could long jump if she wanted. It was so impressive, the wide range of events she could handle. You don't see those type of athletes very often." In love with track after her freshman season, Komperda gave up basketball for cross country as a sophomore. The decision was sparked by a conversation with older Brunswick distance and cross country runners Evan Jarold and Alex Keller on the drive home from the 2022 state track meet. "I knew basketball wasn't going to be for me because my coaches wanted me to come to (basketball) practice the week of the state (track) meet," she said. "Evan was saying, 'You'd be so good at cross,' so two weeks later I started training for cross. "I love track and all my teammates, but it's so much smaller in cross and you bond so much more. We did stuff all the time as a team because it was easier to get us all together and we all had the same race in common." With long legs and great speed and endurance, Komperda was a natural. She earned All-Gazette honors in that sport as a senior, when she ran a season-best 19:10.82 at the Berlin Bear Dash. She also finished second at the Greater Cleveland Conference Meet and fifth at the Lorain District before an inner and outer ear infection caused her to dip to 93rd at the Boardman Regional. "Monday and Tuesday (before regionals) all I did was sit in bed," Komperda said. "I could barely sleep. It was awful. I don't think I've ever been in so much pain. I tried to run through it, but it was so hard." "She would have been a state qualifier the last two years, but she broke her foot her junior year and last year she got really sick at the end of the season," Hunter added. "She had some bad luck." When Komperda started cross country, she had "absolutely no idea" how that sport would alter the trajectory of her track career. "The (track) coaches told me middle distance, but they never mentioned the two-mile," she said with a chuckle. "They said we'd focus on the 400 and 800. Then I got put in the mile and I'm like, 'Wait, this is not what I expected.' Then the mile ended up being one of my favorite races to run. "The 100 and 200 are physically straining on your body, but not mentally because you don't have time to think. The 400, 800 and mile, mentally that was a big switch. It's physically draining, but distance running is also so mental." One of those rare athletes who could help her team in almost any event, Komperda even ran the 3,200 once as a senior. Admittedly "not really trying that hard," she turned in a very respectable 11:25. "She can do it all, but you just can't do it all in track," Sofranko said. "The transition she had to make was difficult. You're leaving behind events where you were very successful for the uncertainty of new events. "And this kid did all this on a partially torn labrum. What kind of kid is she? She's tough as nails. It's been up and down and she's had injuries, but she's battled through." As a sophomore, Komperda finished third in the 400 at the GCC Meet. As a junior, she helped the 4x8 reach the state meet and was part of a 4x1,600 with Amber Kemmann, Ella Daddario and Emma Bradbury that ran a school-record 21:05.58. More impressive, her track accomplishments as a junior came after breaking her foot in November of her 11th-grade cross country season. "I learned a lot about resilience over the last four years," Komperda said. "I did everything I could to stay in shape — lift, bike, bands, anything possible. You're going to have pains, but you have to push through them. That's the same as life." While Komperda learned to manage the pain or simply deal with it, handling pre-race jitters remains a work in progress. "I need to find a better coping mechanism, because sometimes I'd throw up," she said. "Right now my best way of coping is breathing and trusting everything I've done. I can count on one hand the number of workouts I missed. I don't miss practice. I run every day and do my lifts, stretches and core. I just have to trust myself and have confidence that I'm good." Though she fell just short of her goal of breaking school records in the 4x4 and open 800, Komperda enjoyed an outstanding senior season, which included the GCC and Brunswick District team titles. Despite not running the 4x4 as a 12th-grader until the district preliminaries, Komperda teamed with Zaria Roberts, Maggie Romano and Kaila Peterson to finish sixth in the 4x4 at the D-I state meet. She also placed eighth in the open 800 and 13th in the 4x8 with Romano, Kemmann and Kylie Lockwood. At Kent State, Komperda could run anything from the 800 to the 5,000, with the steeplechase also a strong possibility. In that scenario, a Brunswick career that saw her run times of 13.63 seconds in the 100, 59.98 in the 400, 2:12.81 in the 800 and 5:06.73 in the 1,600 will have served as perfect preparation. "I wanted to try every single event," she said. "I even wanted to do discus, but it's just too much. This year I had too many options and had to pick between the 800, mile and two-mile. I wanted to be on the 4x-4, so I decided against the two-mile." Komperda also dropped the 1,600 after finishing second at the Brunswick District to increase her chances of qualifying for state at the Port Clinton Regional, which she did in the 800 (4th), 4x4 (2nd) and 4x8 (4th). "I loved trying new things," she said. "In track, there's so much. My first 800 was so hard I didn't ever want to run it again, but then I learned how to run it. I figured things out and how to flip the different gears in my body. It was really fun to run the 400 and 1,600 in the same day." Komperda credited all her Brunswick coaches for helping her succeed, as well as her teammates and parents, Cristen and Jason. Her mom's highly nutritious but tasty meals were particularly cherished, as was her advice that sometimes doing a bit less training could be beneficial in the long run. "My parents have always provided everything for me, from shoes to running clothes," Komperda said. "They gave me all that and a lot of support, and they stayed on me. "My coaches all believed in me and my potential. They'd come up and say, 'Liv, you're going to be great.' I didn't know what I could do, so it was great that someone believed in me and thought I could do things I couldn't even imagine." Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4046 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com. Follow him @RickNoland on X.