We arrived at the community centre today for Hanna’s cross country run.
Chloe and I were the first to show up at 8:30am for the 9am race (?) that got underway shortly after 10am. An hour and a half of Chloe asking for running, racers, crackers, Hanna, clapping, Elmo, tea-hot, hot-tea, tea-hot, was enough to make me want to run the route naked with her on my shoulders and call it a day.
Hanna’s group was the first to race. We waited at the finish line–a row of pylons at the end of a soccer field. They would lap us twice and finish on the third loop around.
According to the other kids who eagerly ran up to me panting at the end of the race, “Hanna was in first! Hanna was in first!” Apparently, Hanna had a handsome lead early in the race and without hesitation gave all the juice she had in the first 100m. Unfortunately, it was a 2.6 km race, this of course much shorter than the 30,000 metres plus 1 mile she had confirmed with me earlier.
When I saw her pass the first time, she was in about fourth place. I couldn’t even cheer for her for fear I would be too choked up to shout anything other than, “Are you warm enough sweetheart?” or “Hercules! Hercules!” or “Mama loves her baby!”
Wow, fourth place out of what looked like thousands of little girls in a blurry sea behind her. Screw the flossing, our focus moving forward is endurance training. Does anyone have a spare plane ticket to Mexico? Let’s get this kid to the Pan Am games.
Just after Hanna passed us, something interesting happened. She realized she could handily beat all 24000 participants or, she could find her close friend and the two of them could go for a leisurely stroll on a crisp, autumn morning and that’s exactly what they did.
Her first place ribbon became a respectable 37th and I was so proud of her for finishing, just as proud as I would have had she actually run in the race. (insert “you’re such a liar” here)
What I enjoyed seeing was her smiling, that-was-hard-work-but-I-did-it face brush past me en route to find a sipsy of water.
When the announcement that the boys 9 and under race was about to begin, she circumvented the picnic table where her water bottle awaited and sprinted to chase after the boys in her class and cheer them on. She ran faster in this, the chasing-of-the-boys race than I have ever seen her run.
Note to future organizers—if you want the girls 9 and under timed run to speed up substantially, tell them there are some cute boys waiting at the finish line.
