Imagine a high school swimmer who’d never done the breaststroke before trying it for the first time, practicing for a month, then finishing top five in the state.

Or how about a gymnast who’d never done the uneven bars working on them for a few weeks and nailing a state medal?

It sounds ridiculous, right? Of course that could never happen. Except in the sport of track and field, well, things like that can happen, in unusual cases.

Take Kate Voelker, who a little more than a month ago was enjoying a routine season as a sophomore runner for Manhasset, specializing in the 400 hurdles.

Then one day her teammate, Megan Tian, suggested Voelker try the high jump, saying that Voelker is athletic and might be good at it.

“I said ‘OK, but I’m going to look really un-athletic doing it because I’d never done it before,” Voelker recalled. “And so she set the bar at 5’3,” and I cleared it pretty easily.

“And I thought, ‘hmmm, maybe I actually could be good at this.'”

A few short weeks later, Voelker had qualified for the state championships in Syracuse, and on June 8 she leaped over a bar set at 5’7,” tied for second in the event (Voelker officially placed fourth due to tiebreakers).

She was a mere one inch away from being a state champion. In an event she’d never done before May.

“It’s really an incredible, crazy story, and a testament to how good an athlete Kate is,” said Manhasset track and field coach Steve Steiner. “She showed an aptitude for it, and very quickly learned how to do it well.”

Voelker, who in an interview a few days after the meet still seemed kind of stunned at what she had done, said the mental and physical approach to high jump is unlike anything she’s done before.

“It’s not as hard physically as running, but mentally you have to be exactly on it, concentrating, because it’s over so fast,” Voelker said. “Now that I know I can do this, I want to train and get a lot better and get back here (next year.)”

Voelker’s performance was one of several medal-winning efforts from locals at the state meet, held on June 7-8.

Despite weather delays pushing some field events back a day, Roslyn’s Zachary Davidson won his second state medal of the year. After placing third in the state indoors in March, Davidson, a junior, repeated that strong outing by again finishing third.

This time Davidson soared 15 feet over the bar, finishing one foot behind the winner.

“I was pretty happy with how I did; definitely had set 15 (feet) as a goal so really glad I did it,” Davidson said. “Going to work hard this summer and my new goal is 17 feet.

“I see no reason to set limits.”

For the Manhasset boys 4×800 relay team, the outdoor meet was an almost-exact replica of the indoor meet in March.

Once again the Manhasset quarter of John Hogan, Cole Thalheimer, Ryan Boldi and Blake Sealy were right there to win the crown, battling Saratoga Springs.

In the winter, Saratoga edge Manhasset out by three seconds. This outdoor race was even closer, as Manhasset’s time of 7:53.78 was just edged out by Saratoga, who ran a 7:52.88.

Less than one second difference in an eight-minute race.

“We ran a second faster than our previous best, and one of our guys (Cole Thalheimer) was a little hurt, so we were really happy with out time,” Boldi said. “But yeah, losing by a second… we definitely are going to beat them next time.”

With all four Manhasset competitors returning next year, they’re a good bet to do just that.

Finally, it was another outstanding state meet for Great Neck South’s Isabella Spagnoli. The junior who excels in cross country as well had her highest state finish yet in a career filled with them, as she placed fifth in the 2000-meter steeplechase, in 7:05.00

“I was really scared before the race because I’d done really badly my last two state meets, and I really wanted to medal,” Spagnoli said. “But I went out really fast, hurdled over the steeple without touching it, and was able to finish really strong.”

Port Washington’s Bella Lucas also came home with a medal from states, as her leap of 38 feet, 1.50 inches in the triple jump was good for eighth place.