Dual-sport stuff isn’t for everyone.

Excelling in two sports during the same season isn’t easy, but the time management might be tougher.

For Lawrence High’s Lindsay Garito and Free State’s Lauren Abney, Lacey Baxter and Jamie Stanclift, juggling two practices, games, track meets, homework and everything else during the spring can be taxing. But isn’t that the challenge?

“I think all of these girls all of their lives have been in so many activities, they really don’t think it’s that different,” FSHS softball coach Pam Pine said. “I know Jamie’s always had 100 things going on, and I’m sure Lauren and Lacey are the same way.”

Juniors Baxter and Abney are two-year starters for Firebird softball and have qualified for the state track meet. Stanclift, a sophomore shortstop, is trying to make the track trip to Wichita this year.

Garito may be the Lions’ best soccer player, but the senior also is a crucial part of the LHS girls’ track team, running on the 4×100- and 4×400-meter relays and the 100-meter dash.

“It just takes a special kind of athlete to be able to do that,” LHS track coach Jerry Skakal said.

Hey, it’s just what these girls do.

Bo who?

Garito pulled a big double in April when she ran two relays at the Kansas Relays during the day, then zipped to the Youth Sports Inc. fields and scored the winning goal for the Lions that night.

But Abney might top that with a state title in the javelin.

As if track and field weren't enough, four city high school girls compete in a second spring sport. From left, Free State High juniors Lacey Baxter and Lauren Abney and sophomore Jamie Stanclift play softball; Lawrence High senior Lindsay Garito plays soccer.

Blessed with what FSHS throws coach Darrell Andrew calls a strong arm and great hips for throwing the javelin, Abney has the second best throw in Class 6A this season at 131 feet, 2 inches.

She was sixth at the Relays this year, and Andrew thinks she could throw 140 feet if the conditions are right.

“She’s got the consistency, now we’ll see if she can pop one,” he said.

Oddly, one of the few things Abney struggles with is her release, where she tends to snap down with her wrist –a carryover from throwing across the mound from third base. Without practicing every day, Abney’s technique can suffer.

“There’s always something wrong. It changes weekly,” she said. “There’s a lot of technical stuff to grasp.”

Stanclift has similar problems in the shot put — her only track event until she starts running the 400 next season — but technical problems are also Baxter’s biggest woe.

She runs the 400, but that’s simple compared to pole vaulting in her spare time. There isn’t a more complicated event than pole vault, but Baxter succeeds — her mark of 9-0 is the fifth-best height in 6A — because of natural ability and a heavy gymnastics background.

“That’s why she can do so well without practicing during the week,” FSHS pole vault coach John Olson said. “But it’s tough to make gains when I only see her once a week.”

Baxter could qualify for state in both events, but will be pressed to medal in either. Still, without extensive training, simply qualifying is impressive.

Never enough time

Here’s the typical week: After school, Garito goes to soccer practice, while Abney, Baxter and Stanclift head to the softball diamond. They practice for about two and a half hours, then head to track practice — if there’s not a game that night. If the Lions play, Garito heads to track first. The Firebirds aren’t so lucky. If they can’t get to practice, they’ll come in Saturday or Sunday.

Oh yeah, they also miss lots of class. Baxter spends so much of her time making up homework from her day’s last two classes that she’s exhausted by the weekend.

“It gets hard when you just want to go home and just watch TV and go to sleep,” she said. “You have to find time for homework. If it was just the two sports, it’d be a lot more fun.”

Garito goes from practice at Holcom Sports Complex back to LHS. The 30- to 45-minute workout mostly consists of working on the 4×100 hand-offs and starts for the 100 dash, so it goes by quickly.

Besides, she’s practicing with her buddies — seniors Shari Lassiter and Audrey Pope — who were the ones that convinced her to run track.

“A lot of my friends run on the relay team,” she said. “So they said I should come out.”

First, she had to ask.

“I’ll never forget the day she came out,” Skakal said. “I told (Pope and Lassiter) she had to come up to me and ask because I didn’t want it coming from them. I wanted her to do it. So they go over and talk to her and she walks over, real deliberate, that heel-to-toe kind of walk. It takes about two minutes, and she finally asks, ‘Can I run?’

“I said, ‘OK, let’s go.'”

Sharing Garito has never been a problem for either Skakal or LHS soccer coach Keith Nelson. Conflicts have arisen with FSHS softball and track — mostly because of rained-out games and a compacted May schedule — but for the most part, it has been a good marriage for both squads, which says a lot about both the coaches and the athletes. Pine, Stanclift’s mother, said if the sports conflicted, all three have promised to play softball.

But that’s a decision they’ve never had to make.

“Coach Pine — mom — made it clear to us softball is our first priority,” Stanclift said. “We have a whole team relying on us.”

More on the way

Stanclift said the draw of running track was too hard to ignore this year, and Abney and Baxter both feel the same way.

It also seems the same thing applies to LHS freshmen Megan Johnson and Raya Bowden.

Both play for the LHS soccer team, but haven’t been able to run for the high school squad until Friday’s Shawnee Mission North Relays because of freshman rules regarding track. But they’ll likely continue the double until they graduate.

If Skakal had his way, they wouldn’t be the only ones, either. Soccer, softball, swimming, he’d take anyone.

“Oh, I’d love one,” Skakal said. “We’ll bend over backwards to two-sport people, especially for girls. There’s so much going on for girls in the spring, if we can get them to run track too, we’d love it.”