20:47 - Jordan's XC Kix Off

It's that time of year again . . . the blog will be dominated by cross country news, whether you like it or not. Today was Jordan's first XC race in Indiana. It was a home meet and it was a beautiful day for a run . . . sunny and in the upper 70s with, for Indiana, low humidity.

Race day was not without controversy. Yesterday, Jordan's alarm didn't go off and he missed the team's 6 AM practice. Unfortunately, the day before, the coach had told everyone that missing practice would result in being held out of the race. This was Jordan's first missed practice and he has been one of the most dedicated members of the team. I guess the team rallied to his cause, though and convinced the coach to let him race, apparently in exchange for some extra team wind sprints after practice next week.

Just before the start of the race, the four teams each did a "run out," taking a short jog past the starting line and then huddling up. It was cool to see the Blackhawk guys circle up for a quick prayer.

Jordan didn't get off to a fast start, at least as far as I could tell. I had expected him to be one of the leaders from the beginning but he started well back in the pack.

The course was, of course, rather flat (and kind of boring . . . I imagine that will be the norm this season no matter where the races are held). There was only one little hill . . . more of just an incline. Oh, and a nasty little dip right by the finish line that caught some of the girls by surprise in their race.

As the race wore on, Jordan worked his way up through the pack. There were probably about 30 runners, I'm guessing, and early on he was probably about 20th.

Coming to where the runners neared the final stretch of the race, Jordan ran right by us. He was inspired, no doubt, by my encouragement to "Run hard!" MelodyJoy joined in, her first cheerleading experience:



Jordan did finish well, in 11th place at the end, with a time of 20:47. I asked him if he should have kicked sooner and he said he just didn't have anything left to kick with.

Last year, his first race--the Lakeview Invitational--was 22 minutes flat, though all of his subsequent times were faster than today's. I noted that Lakeview was a mile high but Jordan countered that there wasn't any humidity there. His coach was pleased with today's performance. His next race is Wednesday evening.