One kick, one stuck cleat, and Baker High junior Meren Jesenko went down on the soccer field.

“My foot went one way and my knee went the other,” she said. “I heard a really loud snap.”

Her kneecap, she said, popped back into place when she fell, but soon the adrenaline faded, replaced by pain.

“I was on the ground for quite a while,” Jesenko said.

She was hurt on Oct. 2, 2024. She had surgery two days later to repair her medial patellofemoral ligament, which helps stabilize the kneecap.

“It’s basically what keeps your kneecap in place. I tore it off the bone,” she said.

Jesenko went home to recover. Her leg was still numb, but at first she wasn’t worried.

A day passed, then another, and she still couldn’t feel her leg. She found out she’d reacted badly to the nerve block from surgery, and her brain was acting like she didn’t have a leg anymore.

“My leg stayed numb for two or three months,” she said.

She wasn’t thinking about the soccer field — instead, she worried about track.

In 2024, as a sophomore at Baker High School, Jesenko won the district meet in the 300-meter hurdles race with a time of 48.23 seconds.

As a junior, she planned to run indoor track during the winter to prepare for the spring season at BHS.

But now she couldn’t wiggle her toes. Or walk.

Hurdling requires both, and so much more, as a runner sprints around the track and jumps over eight hurdles on the way to the finish.

“It was really, really hard,” Jesenko said, recounting the days she sat at home with her leg propped on a pillow.

She missed school, and missed her friends.

“I just wanted to be around people,” she said.

She works at Sweet Wife Baking, and for several hours a day she’d sit on a stool at the front counter to help customers.

“People would ask me to get things. I’d have to tell them I couldn’t walk,” she said.

She kept going to the gym to work on upper body strength.

“I’d crutch everywhere. It was embarrassing,” she said with a laugh.

Then more negative news came — her medical team discovered that her knee had built up cartilage and wouldn’t bend.

The next step in her recovery was manipulation of her muscles, and soon she could wiggle her toes and flex her calf muscles. But her hamstring and quadriceps were slow to respond. Even when the muscles started to “wake back up,” she was told recovery would take 12 to 18 months — a prognosis that would greatly interfere with her track season.

“That was the hardest part,” she said.

But her leg started responding in January, and she focused on rebuilding the leg muscle that had been dormant for so long.

“I was in the gym every day, and eat a lot of protein,” she said.

She was able to snowboard, then she started jogging. Then, finally, she could sprint.

Track practice started March 3 and Jesenko was there, ready to get started on a new season.

Although the physical injury was frustrating, she said the mental part was even tougher.

She credits her track coaches, who have dealt with injuries of their own, with helping her with patience and confidence.

“Some days are worse than others,” she said. “Mindset was the biggest part, and being patient with myself. I’m not a patient person.”

This season she’ll again compete in the 300-meter hurdles, as well as two team relay races — 4×400 and 4×100.

She loves the sprinting races.

“It’s so fast. I love the energy,” she said.

As for going back to soccer?

“No. Definitely not,” she said with a laugh.

Running in Australia

Jesenko was invited to compete for the USA team at the Coast to Coast Track and Field Championships in Queensland, Australia, this July. She’ll be there for two weeks, with practices twice a day and four days of competition in the 300-meter hurdles and a 4×400 relay race. She’ll get to do some sightseeing, too.

She’s been saving money for the trip — both her pay from Sweet Wife and checks from selling her pig at the Baker County Fair.

As a boost, her employers, Jenny Mowe and Loran Joseph, launched “Meren Mondays” with 5% of sales on Mondays going to support her Australia trip.