Stories from your childhood Cross-Country or Track Days (Read 654 times)

Bugs, that's kind of a sad story . I hope you got other opportunities to compete without events conspiring against you. As for my own stories, I was a non-athlete in school, so strictly nothing to tell! . My brother was the star athlete of the family, I tried to distinguish myself with theatre and music. "The hills are alive with the sound of...... " (that's an opera singer smiley)

I was a sprinter and a triple jumper in school. One day during practice my coach was trying to get me to lean forward more while I ran, so I was running down the track trying to lean forward, and I got to going so fast and leaning too far forward that I ran right into the ground. I have never felt comfortable sprinting since because I've never gotten over that fear of tripping and falling down.

This one time at track practice the weight men had as their workout to run to a local ice cream stand and back--about a mile each way. They were allowed to get an ice cream if they wanted, as long as they ran back. Their coach waited in his car on the way back to note which ones were walking. When they got back he lined them up and made them run around the track until they puked, shouting and publicly humiliating them the whole way. As a middle distance guy I was sort of happy to see them feeling some semblance of what we felt during our multiple gut-wrenching workouts per week, but I couldn't help but feel like the whole thing was a trap and not really fair. For his part, the weight men's captain took all the blame and he ran longer and harder than anybody...I don't think he ever puked and eventually the coach had to make him stop.

My best memories are of my brother's antics in cross country. He was a natural 200/400 meter runner. When it came to cross country, he just played the clown. The highlights: He always sported a mullet during cross country season. That, combined with his 6', 180 lb. frame, made him the sore thumb in 200 person fields of skinny twiggy dudes. His trademark style of racing was jog 3 miles then pull the grunt-and-kick over the last 0.1. There's plenty of flim evidence of him scaring the bejezzus out of any runner within earshot. There was one meet where he dug a broken pair of football shoulder pads out of the dumpster before boarded the bus to head to the meet. He did his warmup wearing the shoulder pads. That same meet, there was a circle of girls from another school dancing in the parking lot to their favorite R&B tunes. He couldn't resist that and joined in with the goofiest white-boy boogie imaginable. The girls loved it and it's still one of the strangest and funniest memories from back then. The one that takes the cake was from a dual meet against the best team in the league. The eventual top 3 finishers in the league that year were in the field. My bro goes out like a banshee and leads the field by 20-30 meters by the 200 meter mark. He screams through a downhill and makes a sharp right, out of sight. I didn't see him until a quarter mile in, and he's laying on the ground, groaning and clutching his head. I see him again, around the mile mark with another teammate kneeling over him, holding what appears to be a pair of vice grips over his forehead. It wasn't until after the race that I found out what happened. After his idiot start, he was looking behind him to see how far back the field was. When he turned around, he had veered slightly off the trail and ran into some brush. He ran a little ways before realizing one of the smaller twigs had become lodged in his forehead. It was at that point, he fell to the ground, exhausted and tried unsuccessfully to dig the stick out. The vice grips later didn't do the job either and took a trip to the emergency room to get it dug out, and have his head sewn up with one stich.

Good idea for a Thread Bugs. When my 800 m running partner suggested that my nickname should not be Amos but rather Anus I objected and said that I would rather be called Penis. And so, no pun intended, the name Penis stuck. "Go, Penis" "Faster, Penis" "Looking Good, Penis"

1) Track season in Mississippi is also when it begins to really warm up. Most memories revolve around laying down on a blanket spread across the grass pretending to work on my tan b/w races...when I was really just watching all the track girls working on their tans. 2) Breaking 5:00/mile in 10th grade 3) Running anything and everything just to get points for the team cause "I could handle it"...I even pole vaulted one meet and high-jump once b/c the elite jumpers didn't show and I was the only one to clear the opening height. 4) Running the 2 mile and then turning right around and running the anchor on the mile relay every Saturday ...Gutcheck it was. 5) Being invited to MS Indoor meet in the winter and getting the opportunity to race George Kersh (He barely missed the Olympics twice in the 800)...actually thinking I would be able to run with him for a bit. He was incredible...The closest I got to him was the starting line. 6) Cross-Country - I got to miss football practice one day week and not get in trouble for it.

I've blocked most of high school out, so about my only memory of track (besides hating it) is this: After my event (the mile), a herd of girls from my class came up to me and told me that "Kim" needed to see me in the locker room. I went in, and Kim and about five or six of her friends were standing around. She turned bright red, and told me she had peed in her shorts, and asked to borrow mine. I lent her the shorts, and told no one about this story, until now.