Poor Start, Strong Finish

The last few days have not been anything special, but some strange things have happened. I'll start with Friday morning. Actually, I'll take a few steps back and look at Thursday night. Of course my roommates left for a very small portion of the night on Thursday because that's the thing to do. Thursday night was typical, they left and came back sometime between 1 and 2 a.m. and played shitty music loudly and brought back obnoxious girls. I've gotten very used to this and thought nothing of it, except that I'm more than ready to graduate and be done with it. I got up Friday morning and went downstairs to the kitchen to get some juice to eat with breakfast before class. When I got to the kitchen I thought I was suddenly in the movie Die Hard and I looked around to see if Bruce Willis was around. What I saw to trigger this reaction was shattered glass all over the floor.

Remember that part in Die Hard when Bruce Willis had to walk over broken glass barefoot? That was awesome.

I had no idea what had happened, I hadn't heard anything last night, but whatever had been broken wasn't just dropped, it was obliterated. Of course no one else I live with has any idea what happened either. I think they ended up blaming it on some tool they were hanging out with the night before. But for all I know it could have been the Boogeyman. We think the victim was a glass bowl that one of my roommates uses for popcorn, but who knows. As long as it wasn't one of my things, I guess I don't really care. You know what else is kind of funny, all the glass is still on the floor now, it's just not spread out all over the floor. Now the glass is in a nice neat pile in front of the sink. I think I might wait to see how long it sits there as some kind of a social experiment where I do absolutely nothing to help. I wanted to do the same thing with the dirty dishes in the sink, but I actually want to use those so I never actually did it. I'll take bets on how long the glass will sit in a pile on the floor. I'm also still waiting for someone to stab themselves.

In other news, we had a track meet yesterday where I had a first time experience. This experience revolved around the blocks. For people unfamiliar with track, the blocks are the supports used in sprinting races that allow runners to push off the angled supports to ensure a better start.

Starting blocks, a sprinter's best friend!

Blocks are anchored into the track surface by spikes similar to the ones used in sprinting spikes, or at least I think they look similar. Before the race I did two practice starts/runs at the first hurdle and everything was fine. Actually, I felt quite good, also due in part to the excellent weather. However, when the gun went off for the race to begin, the blocks slid back on me and I went nowhere. This could be partly my fault because I didn't have anyone stand on the back of the blocks for extra support, but I've done without that many times and it has not been an issue, until now that is. The blocks slid out from under me and I almost fell on my face. I looked up and saw everyone else racing their way toward the first hurdle and I decided, hell, I may as well run anyway. So I proceeded to run the race with one of the worst starts I could imagine. I basically made a handicap for myself and was faced with a task I hope I will never have again: running people down in the 110 meter hurdles. Check out these pictures to see how far behind I was at the beginning of the race. You should have no difficulty picking me out if you don't know what I look like.

Wait for me

I still want to race

I ended up running a shitty time by my expectations, but it could have been a lot worse actually. In fact, I've runner slower times in my career when nothing bad happened in the race except me sucking. I don't know what's worse, the fact that I still beat some of my previous times despite my blocks slipping out from under me, or that I managed to come in third in this race. Addressing the first statement, I guess that just shows my improvement over the years. I have been happy that I have run faster each year throughout college. In a strange way, I think that this experience might have been very good for me, at least there are some positives that came out of it.When this happened, I felt a sense of panic and exhilaration, I just had to get back into the race. My senior year in high school, which was the best by far in my high school track career, I always felt like I could turn it on in the 110 hurdles, to some extent that is. I would be in situations where I would think I need to put some distance between me and my competitors or that I just needed to try to keep up with someone. In the race yesterday, I felt like that panic and adrenaline rush led to the same type of situation, except I felt like I had to catch up. The guys that came in first and second are both very good, so I knew there was no chance catching them, but I was able to run down and beat the other guys in the race.

After the race, I was speaking with one of my coaches who had seen all the events of the race unfold. He told me that he thinks that the unfortunate beginning of the race could have hindered by my time by an entire second, which is a really long time in a race, especially one that is only 110 meters. If that's true, I probably actually ran the best race of my college career in the high hurdles yesterday, it just won't show up that way in the results. I'll use it as a great source of encouragement and I'm excited to get back out on the track and see what I can do!

Another side note about my college athletic career, I always have a good time looking at the articles on our school's website about the track team. Practically every single article, I can't remember one that hasn't, mentions "strong performances from so-and-so." You can tell that the people who write the articles have no idea about track and what good times for certain events are. Also, since the vast majority of this post has been dedicated to sports, I would like to welcome any readers to check out the new sports blog that a couple friends and I just started, Penultimate Round Pick. We hope to deliver a unique view on sports that has a marginal entertainment value.

We have much higher hopes for PRP than Retentive Gibberish since there is a defined focus for the articles. So check it out, there are already a few articles up and hopefully many more to come in the near and far out future! Also, while it is not my phrase, I want to remind everyone, be champions!