For the past 2 weeks, my little sister Mia started coming to our team’s cross country practices. She wanted to try it out and maybe even do a race as a SoCal Roadrunner! As a 6 year old, she would be racing in the Sub-Bantam (7-8 yr olds) division.
I was so excited when she decided to race this weekend. She was really nervous but she figured out how to get through it on her own. She even managed to take 10th place! I’m so proud of her!
Here is a video of her race:
Yesss!! I finished my race in 5th place!!!! I was so proud of myself when I finished. When I saw my mom, she hugged me so tight. She was very amazed.
At the start, there were 250 boys lined up all the way across this huge field. I was on the far left with the rest of my teammates. I had a strong start, but there were a lot of boys that were ahead of me when the course narrowed. I just kept my pace strong and cleared my mind.
My coach told us that since this is the last race of the season, that we should be completely exhausted by the end. We should have nothing left. So I ran at my maximum. When I finished I was so tired. I was so tired that I was crying.
My team took 2nd place. We were all very excited. Here are our results.
After the race, my mom and I went straight to Toys R Us and I got to pick out a new yo-yo! This was very exciting because my mom NEVER takes me to Toys R Us.
We went to a special victory dinner with my team and then after that we went to the USATF Awards Ceremonies. I got 2 awards – one for my individual results and the other for my team results. I had such a fun time this weekend and am so happy!
I am h
ere in Alabama and it is the day before my big race. I met a new friend at the airport on the way here. His name is Jack and we ended up sitting together on the plane. He is on the same team as me. I am still meeting a lot of my teammates because I started so late. We had a lot of fun. He brought his DS and we battled each other in Mario Kart, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games, and New Super Mario Bros.
This morning I went to the course at Veterans Park and jogged through it to get the feel of it
. The start is really wide and then it narrows into a path that goes around a lake. You have to go around the lake twice before you then loop around another section to the finish. After the jog-through, my team practiced several starts.
After our morning at the course, my mom and I went to the Wynfrey Hotel and we bought some sweatshirts for souvenirs. I got a really cool bright yellow sweatshirt 🙂
I have been thinking a lot about tomorrow and I am a little bit nervous. My mom tells me I shouldn’t be, but I am. I bet all the runners are feeling the same way. My mom says to just do my best! And I will.
We ended up going to lunch with Jack’s family. Then we headed over to the Opening Ceremonies at Samford University. It was really fun. They had a big band playing music as we paraded into the stadium. There were 16 regions from across the country. I am from Region 15. Each region had these “Hoover Belles” leading the way. They were girls who were wearing really big dresses and hats. 
At the ceremony, the director of the competition spoke. Also, a man named Chris Solinsky spoke. He is an amazing athlete and runner. He gave a speech encouraging all of us to do our best. Afterwards, at the big Pasta Dinner, I got to meet him and get his autograph. It was so cool. I will have to write more about him later.
That’s all for now. I’ll keep you updated.
This weekend I am going to Alabama because I qualified for the USATF National Junior Olympics Cross Country competition. I am very excited and proud of myself.
My goal is to try to come in the top 25 runners. I learned that if you place in the top 25, you achieve All-American honors. I don’t really exactly know what that means, but my mom told me that she was 20 years old when she earned it in tennis. Since I’m 8, I think it would be cool to get it now 🙂
I also hope to complete the race in under 11 minutes. These are very hard goals but I once heard that if you reach for the moon and you fall short, you will land in the stars. I like that. So I want to aim really really high.
I also like the idea of winning a medal, too.
After my 5k race last week, I decided to give cross country another shot. Over the summer I tried a few practice sessions with the San Diego Socal Roadrunners which is a local running club. It was fun but since I was also doing soccer at the time, I decided not to do it.
But now that soccer is coming to an end, I thought about it again and met with the coach to possibly join the team. I didn’t realize, however, that the cross country season is practically over. The coach said that the only races left were two qualifiers for the USATF National Junior Olympics. He was nice and invited me to come to practice anyway.
My first practice was on Tuesday, the same day as the NBC News taping at my school. It was a long day since I was up at 5am, ran 7 miles at school, and then had his practice at 5pm.
The practice was kind of hard for me. I had never done any sort of special warm-up or stretching before running and the team all seemed to know what they were doing. Also, the practice was a series of six 600 meter runs at race pace with very little rest in between. The coach told me to run with certain kids and I did my best. My cough was getting worse but I didn’t want to complain. After the workout, the coach asked me to come back and try to compete in the first national qualifier which is this weekend, on Sunday. I said “okay.”
So far, I don’t know anyone on the team. They have all been together since June and they all know each other. I’m sort of a stranger to them and nobody really talks to me, but it’s okay.
I’ve started taking antibiotics and doubling up on my green smoothies every day to get rid of my cough. I am looking forward to the race and hope to do well.