2011 Cross Country Season Begins

Aug 30, 2011 by Greg Fowler

Plans change.  Last week I was planning to do a 10 miler on Saturday.  Over 2 months since my last double digit run, I was anxious to get to that distance again.  Late in the week, though, we found out our son would be making the Saturday trip with the cross country team to a season-opening meet in North Carolina.  10 miler out the window.  No big deal.

So, we ventured to McAlpine Creek Park in Charlotte to watch our Lexington (SC) Wildcats compete with about 40 other high schools in the Providence Invitational Cross Country meet. This post is not about tooting the horn for South Carolina’s two-time defending 4A state champs in Cross Country, Lexington (The varsity boys won!), or their #1 runner Colby Coulter (he finished first) or the fact my son, running as part of the JV team, cut over a minute off his PR (I’ll never catch him now!)

No, this post is to encourage you to get out and watch a cross country meet this fall.  For the next 2 months, there are many meets each week in any area of the country, probably on a Tuesday or Wednesday night.  Sometimes, there are Saturday meets with larger fields, like this past weekend.

Around here, the race distance for high schools is 5K (3.1 miles).  At any one meet, there will be 3-4 separate races – varsity boys, varsity girls, JV boys and JV girls.  Sometimes, JV boys and girls run at the same time.  Usually there is no cost to enter, either.  I have had to pay for parking once or twice.

You will be inspired by these young people, from the top veteran kids who battle it out at sub 16:00 times, to the newbie runners struggling to finish.  I always leave a meet wanting to go for a run and kicking myself for not running cross country in high school.

To learn more about cross  country in South Carolina go to http://www.scrunners.com.

For a comprehensive schedule of South Carolina cross country events click here.

POFIFOTO!