RACE REPORT: DISTRICTS (V)

This post is the latest installment about how our 4x800 team was getting gypped. On Wednesday, we were to find out the decision on whether or not we would run at state. I had been going on adrenaline since districts and this day was not different. It made me nervous as I sat in class, knowing that our athletic director was meeting with the people in charge of the district and then going to the state officials to make their decision. We knew there was a very slim chance that we would get to race at state, but we weren't going down without a fight. There was still that little part of us full of hope, believing we would run.

After school, we went to the track sendoff (which is dumb and a waste of time when we could be at practice) and the AD met us at the door, telling us that he needed to talk with us. By the look on his face, it was not going to be good news. So we sat there at a table together, as the AD gave a speech to all the state track athletes wishing us luck and telling us how special it was to run at Drake. Because I went to state last year, I know how amazing it is to run on that beautiful blue track, but it felt like he was rubbing it in. He was telling us how awesome it was while we knew that he'd probably come over afterwards and tell us that we wouldn't experience that this year.

The AD waited for the rest of the runners to leave before talking to us, our head coach, the principal, and our coach, who came in late. Nobody looked happy and we knew. We knew we weren't going to run on that beautiful blue track this year. The principal even hugged AL and JS before the athletic director explained the situation.

He had met with the people in charge of districts and watched the video. The automatic timer wasn't working so they had another timer in the video. On this timer, you could very clearly see that it said 10:23 as I crossed the line. But it didn't matter. It turns out that you had to contact the district people within 48 hours to appeal the results. That would mean we had until Sunday night, only a few hours after we found out that something wasn't right. It didn't matter that we didn't know about the wrong results because our head coach had them, that the state qualifying list came out on Sunday, that some districts were postponed until Saturday when they weren't supposed to be, or that nobody would have been at the office on Saturday or Sunday. The AD had argued these points and more but it didn't change the decision. The only way we were going to state was as a member of the crowd and not a competitor.

I had released most of my disappointment on Monday but it was still hard to listen to this. I couldn't look at any of the adults or else I would have started crying. Looking at JS and AL, they were having similar problems. We knew that our coach and the AD had done their best to fix the problem, they had kept fighting for us. The AD told us that he had yelled at the district and state officials because it wasn't our fault and we were getting punished for it. He said he had tried to get them to change the rule, explaining everything that had happened, saying it wasn't fair that four high school girls were paying for a mistake made by an adult. The AD told us that he would say nobody felt worse then him about the situation, but that he couldn't say that because he wasn't us. I believe what he said, partly because he used to be the girl's track head coach, but also the look on his face as he was telling this to us. He looked so upset, but then, it was hard not to be. No amount of apologizing could make up for what was being taken from us.

We were still going to state, except for RB, because, as they told us, we deserved to be there. We had ran the time so we should get the reward, but we were only getting part of it. The three of us went to talk to our coach outside his room about the plan, but then he led us into the office nearby. The last time I was probably in there, was a year and a half ago, after state xc when our coach was yelling at us. Our coach sat down at the table though, as we sat down across from him. We didn't know what he was going to say, but it was obviously more than just about what the plans were for state. It was a lot more.

He told us that it was his fault, that he should've called the AD instead of the head coach when JS called to tell him something was wrong with the qualifying list. That he should've noticed it before. He played the what if game, which I was refusing to participate in. It was hard watching him be so upset when I knew that it wasn't his fault. He had tried so hard, done all he could to fix the situation, he's part of the reason we had made it so far. The two laps taken away from me, the 8 laps of blue taken from our team, weren't directly taken from him. But listening to my coach, looking at how upset he was, it was taken from him too. The meeting was so hard to get through, that I had to stare at a drawer and not say anything so I wouldn't start crying. AL and I left it up to JS to tell him that it wasn't his fault, because we were all on the verge of tears. He had done his best as we had done ours at districts.

We weren't sure what to do at practice but we felt like running. JS and I stretched by ourselves because, technically, our 2009 track season was over. It wasn't like anyone was going to say anything anyways, everyone felt bad for us. We went two miles, because it was hot out. It was hard knowing that we wouldn't be doing strides, because we didn't have a track meet to run at.

Before we went on our little run, the assistant coach mentioned that she had talked to the head coach about the results on Saturday. She had told him that our time wasn't right but he didn't listen. The distance girls don't like the head coach anyways but this made it worse. He would've listened if we had been sprinters. But we aren't and that's part of what makes us good. We are the distance runners, the scampering squirrels.

The 4x800 was ran on Thursday morning, around 11:10. I do not know the results of that race and I do not intend to look them up. My coach told us that the team that qualified last, who shouldn't have raced based on correct district times, wasn't competitive. He said that he knew we would've improved. It doesn't matter if he is right or not though, what matters is that we didn't race at state. This was not just any meet we weren't allowed to run at, this was the state meet at Drake. We might get to race there again but it won't make up for our lost chance. They took it away and we aren't getting it back.