It is XC Season, Ladies and Gentlemen.

Steve Prefontaine--The Patron Saint of Running

    There is no sport quite like cross country and the reason that I think that is so, is in how the sport came about. 200+ years ago, school children of England and Scotland would play a game called "foxes and hares". They would pick several very fast kids and designate them as the "hares" and they would send them off for a small amount of time, then the rest of the kids would play the role of "foxes" and chase after them and the kid or kids that caught the "hare" were declared the winners. Many years rolled by and the game expanded to older kids or schoolchildren and they added barriers, like fences, hedges, and hay bales, for the runners to cross in their hunt for the "hares" and pretty soon the role of "foxes" was changed to the role of being a "huntsman". In the late 1800's, this game of chase began its its slow move to something a little more like the modern-day version of cross country and it is also when the sport made its way across the "big pond" and was brought to America. It was at this time, that some rules and a fixed course for the runners were laid out and made known. 

    Flash forward 200 years and we find one of the fastest growing sports in the country and a sport that is still very similar to its founding. Cross country is not included in the Summer or Winter Olympics because it is not considered a summer or winter sport, but rather a Fall sport. However, each year, there is both a US Championship XC race and there is a World Championship XC race.  The fixed distances for elementary and middle-school runners is somewhere between 0.5 miles (a 1k) to 2 miles (3.2k). The fixed distance for high school runners is 3.1 miles or what is known as a 5k. Once a runner leaves high school, this distance stays the same for women, but for men this distance increases to a 4.96 mile race (8k). 

    Each year, I look forward to the next cross country season the day the preceding one ends. I have coached basketball, soccer, track and cross country and nothing comes close to excitement and joy I find in the sport of cross country. Yes, basketball is a true spectator's sport and its fast-paced and exciting. Yes, soccer is the number one sport in the world and very fun to watch and has even been known to cause riots. And yes, track is fun and every four years, the world stops to watch it. But...for me, there is nothing like standing in a little huddle before the start of a race and breathing in the calm before the storm, praying in earnest for swift feet, calm nerves, and stable footing. Watching each runner read his/her best times written in Sharpie on their hands along with a memory verse. Hearing the pre-race instructions for the 1000th time and waiting with heavy anticipation and my finger on my watch for the blast of the gun or the deafening sound of the air horn to go off. Watching the runners release all their anxiety within the first 100 yards. Dashing to the 1 mile mark to write down times, count runners, watch my watch, call out times, and shout my head off before I rush to the two mile mark. Then running against the runners telling them to pick it up and standing at the 2 mile mark and shouting at my runners to be strong than themselves, where they are in the race, that they can easily run just a mile more, and once again the counting of runners. And then the mad scramble for the finish line shoot where they throw off all their excuses and find that extra gear and go into that place deep inside themselves that they never knew was there. And the ever-present tick of those red numbers at the finish line measuring how fast a man can run 16,000 feet or 3.1 miles. And lastly, the joy or the anguish of the runner who has either given their all or who hates the fact that they had more to give, but didn't. It is the most honesty that one can see in life on most days. And as a XC coach, I get to see all of this and remember what all that felt like and to know that I get to let these runners know that one bad race doesn't define them and that one good race is only the beginning. 

   XC season is short and fast and many times, I am glad it is so. Many days, it is so hard to go straight from teaching for 8 hours to another 2 hours of coaching and instruction, but once I am halfway through the warm up and my little group of runners are getting into the stride and feel of practice, I am so glad that I am getting to share that small piece of life and earth with them. We are running where others have run long before us and we are taking part in a ritual that has been taking place for as long as mankind has walked this planet. We are breathing the freshest of air and moving our bodies in ways that we were created to do. XC is not the most popular sport and I used to be bitter about it, but know I feel like it is my little secret that I get to share with only a handful of people each year. XC is like no other sport and I'm so glad it isn't. 

Happy Running and may the next three weeks of the XC season go slowly,

  David