Adena runner Ryan Richendollar uses state success for college dreams
FRANKFORT, Ohio — As Ryan Richendollar bent down to receive his Division III OHSAA State cross country medal, the realization of his accomplishments from the past six years set in.
The Adena senior ended his high school career with a laundry list’s worth of achievements: Four-time All-Scioto Valley Conference, 2023 SVC Individual Champion, four-time All-Southeast District, 2023 Southeast District Athlete of the Year, four-time state qualifier, three-time All-Ohio, and three-time Academic All-Ohio.
“My main goal when I started running was just to get better,” Ryan said. “My freshman year, state was not even thought of in the beginning, I just wanted to PR.”
For his final state race, Richendollar placed seventh of 186 Division III runners, more runners than any other division. He finished with a time of 15:55.00, which improved upon his freshman year performance, when he finished with a time of 17 minutes and placed 65th overall to miss the podium.
However, the Adena senior knows it took plenty of support and work to get him to that moment.
In the beginning, Richendollar found running fun. He would run with his mom, Melissa, when she would run for half marathons. But it wasn’t something he initially took seriously.
“Ryan started running to stay in shape for other sports he was in at the time,” Melissa said. “During his freshman year, we would go from a cross country meet on Saturday to a baseball game on Sunday,”
While it was not Richendollar’s first passion at the time, running came natural to him. He joined cross country his seventh-grade year, and he placied fourth in the middle school SVC race and first in his eighth-grade year.
Running alongside and learning from top Adena runners Noah Kanniard and Emmitt Cunningham, Richendollar got the boost he needed. Other athletes from the senior class of his freshman year like Preston Sykes, Nate Throckmorton, and Logan Bennet also inspired him to be the best athlete possible.
“As a freshman, we had so many good athletes in our high school … like the senior group,” Ryan said. “I was like ‘Man, I want to be a good athlete and I knew I could do that as a runner.”
To help achieve his dream as a good athlete, one of his biggest supporters, Melissa, stepped up to become his coach. The previous cross country coach Christina Martin stepped down, so Melissa wanted to help Ryan pursue his running dreams.
“I just wanted to see the program continue and build it,” Melissa said. “We had just come off one of our most successful years in 2019 with our team competing in regionals for the first time in over 30 years.”
While Melissa had never coached before, she had been an avid runner and had a background in exercise physiology as the Director of Rehab Services for Adena Health Services.
“I kind of took bits and pieces from a lot of different things,” Melissa said. “I read books, talked to others and just put some things together. Ryan was also instrumental in his own success. He watched YouTube videos, talked to other successful runners and would even bring us a proposal on things he needed or wanted to accomplish.”
While Ryan agrees his mother has been an asset, he says it has been difficult at times.
“While she wants and does the best for us as a team, she’s still my mom so when I come home, she will sometimes still be in coach mode and will critique what I eat and when I go to bed,” Ryan said.
This relationship would still prove fruitful, and serve as a learning experience for both Ryan and his mom.
“I don’t know that I had a lot of expectations at first,” Melissa said. “He won the SVC as an eighth grader. So that that kind of, you know, I guess made me realize that. Okay, there’s some potential there. But you know, I don’t think either of us expected him to qualify for state it was just, we just kept trying to get better.”
Get better he did. During the mid-season is when Melissa believed Ryan had a chance at Regionals. Naturally, that is what they shot for.
“I didn’t even know what it took to run tournaments,” Ryan said.
Both Ryan and his mom treated everything like a nice surprise.
“The pressure wasn’t there,” said Melissa. “He wasn’t putting pressure on himself to make it and we started making those little goals along the way. He got All-SVC. Okay, hit that. Okay. I think you can make it to regionals. Let’s try for that. Hit that. And then we got to regionals. And I thought, I think you’ve had a chance, you know, kind of looking before you know, what was before and I don’t remember what I think you were ranked close to that.”
“I knew he was probably kind of towards that bottom, but it’s like okay, we’re just gonna focus on place and just, you know, do what you can do and so I think it was just a nice surprise every time.”
Those nice surprises led to his first of four state appearances. Ryan remembers that race well.
“That first state race, I was extremely nervous,” Ryan said. “Just really scared because I mean, why not? After I made districts, I was excited. After regionals, I was excited and stuff, and like, it was cool. And when I got there (State), just like, all the people and stuff and the energy, just like I got really nervous before the race started, like, like I was gonna throw up and stuff. And it turned out be fine.”
Three more state showings later, Richendollar has accomplished all his goals and now doesn’t even think about the races.
“I think more about the next day after the race and what I will be doing,” Ryan said.
With the cross country season wrapped up, and with track season around the corner, Ryan isn’t certain about his specific track goals yet. He made it to the state meet in his freshman year but has missed it by a small margin over the past two seasons. Ryan is more focused on college now, as he recently signed to run for Morehead State University.
“For me, sometimes I like being the underdog,” Ryan said. “When I go to college, I will be the underdog. And that makes me want to work. I’m just so much more motivated with cross country right now… I’m just like, maintaining getting faster.”
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