Justin Kempe was mad.
That's it! he shouted, flinging his spikes to the ground. I ran like crap in that race. One of you better run well enough to take my spot next week.
Take his spot? My ears perked up at the words.
Kempe was varsity. Kempe was big-time. He was a senior and a stud runner, and I could just envision myself running faster than he had, in my first collegiate race, no less, and taking his spot in the next race. After all, how hard could this college running thing be, anyway?
A little less than 32 minutes after stepping to the line with a couple of hundred other guys, I found out just how hard it was.
After pounding out five hard miles - nearly two miles more than high school races - I was winded and sore, and I felt what seemed like IV tubes of lactic acid flowing up and down my calves. I had definitely not run well enough to take Kempe's spot. I ran so poorly, in fact, that my first race as a Bobcat was also my last.
That is, of course, the existence of a walk-on athlete: not always the biggest, not always the strongest and, in my case, not always the fastest. Or the second fastest. Or even the 15th fastest.
Walk-ons are the kids who really want to be there, who don't always care about the money. They work harder than everybody else, partly because they're not as physically inclined as other athletes and they need to work harder just to keep pace, but mostly because they love their sport.
It was that way for me with cross country.
I had run all four years during high school, enduring hundreds of practices with Senor, my kilt-wearing, bagpipe-playing Scottish/Canadian coach and Spanish teacher, and I was just too stubborn to give it up.
Even when faced with the difficulties of college running, I was too stubborn to turn away from the sport I loved. Trust me when I say the pre-dawn wake-up calls for morning practices were only the beginning.
Just to get to the one college race I ever ran, for example, I had to skip a class, cram into the back seat of a teammate's car, chip in for gas and parking and borrow another teammate's uniform, as the school only supplied the top eight runners with official garb.
After the race, due to NCAA rules, I wasn't allowed to ride in the team van and I had to pay for my own Arby's dinner.
I could have eaten better and cheaper at Boyd Dining Hall.
At some point during that season, Ohio Director of Athletics Thomas Boeh dropped by Peden Stadium while we were stretching.
Hey
guys he said, How can I help you out?
One runner shouted for more shoes, while another pleaded for more Ohio shirts and shorts.
A third runner cried out, Scholarships for everyone!
Unfortunately, the NCAA limits the number of scholarships. While I'm not even sure that all of the 25 guys on that team cared about the money they did or did not receive, it would have been nice to get something back for such hard work.
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