Last weekend, the cross country team participated in the Centennial Conference championship. It was a cold, rainy, windy day for a cross country meet. By the time all 319 runners had completed their races, the course was a mudslide. By the end of the day, racers and spectators alike were all soaked, and my team had to huddle together to help warm up the racers, who had run for 30 minutes in just tank tops and shorts.
Despite the weather, Bryn Mawr cross country had one of its best Conference finishes in a while, and definitely the best Conference finish that this generation of the team has ever seen. Last year, we edged Gettysburg by just one point, a point that could have come down to a matter of seconds in a 24 minute race. This year, we beat them by 11 points, a difference that is not attributable to seconds.
In other news, track season is right around the corner. For some, it is already upon us. This Monday, I threw shot put for the first time in months, and it was a rude awakening. Based on the way my fellow shotputters have been gingerly lifting even the lightest of objects, I would say that it is a universal truth that even doing 500 pushups a week (a summer regime that lasted a surprisingly long time) and benching in a somewhat regular manner is not the same as heaving a 4k (8.8lb) iron ball across a field. Or, in my case, a third of the way across a field. The difference between training for the 5k and training for every track event under the sun is stark. Gone are the arm lifts that consisted of 50 pushups. Gone are the squat lifts where I could squat low weights as long as I could do it 30 times. Now, it’s a whole new world of squatting my body weight in sets of 3 of the most intense movements I have made. I’m actually benching again, and I won’t be allowed to get away with using assistance on my pull-ups.
Where in cross country I ran in the pouring rain, I now throw in the pitch black. Each throw is accompanied by at least 2 minutes of shuffling around in the leaves in the field where we throw, punctuated by shouts of “I found it! …Nope, just a rock” because an iron shotput is hard to see under leaves at night. Soon I’ll be starting hurdles and block starts and long jump and high jump. My knees will collect bruises from hitting the hurdles, my shoes will fill with sand from the long jump pit, and despite all this I just can’t wait for track.