Care about #29

I had 3 running coaches in high school. 

Two of them instilled hard work, dedication, and perseverance in me. They made me care about the kind of person I was becoming by simply "doing the work". They would tell me that by giving it 100%, I was convincing those varsity runners that they could work that hard to. From the bottom to the top of the team, we all had worth. Coach Christopher changed my life with those comments. Because of those two coaches, I dropped 13 minutes in my 5k, going from 33 minutes to 20.

But there was one coach, the distance track coach. During freshman year, he never seemed to acknowledge me. No "good jobs", no "you're working hard", nothing. I figured it was fine because I was the 29th out of 29 runners on the cross country team, so why would he notice? However, he seemed to treat every runner below #5 like me. No acknowledgement, no encouragement, nothing. I gave him the benefit of the doubt through most of my career, vowing to work harder every track season just so he would know my name. The years went on and I still never got that affirmation or encouragement. Every race for four years, my times got lower, yet his favor still sat at zero. I ended my senior year leading every practice, pushing the pace every workout, encouraging every teammate, and I even became the 5th or 6th best 800m runner in the school. Was I great? Heck no. Was I a member of his team? Absolutely. I was 6th, yet he still treated me like 29th, useless. I left, feeling a bitterness towards that coach, never gaining a single comment of praise during a single race. I don't even think he ever knew my name.

Well, the years went on. I became a middle school track coach. I became a high school cross country coach. I became a college distance coach. I helped lead a college team of 6 (total) guys and 9 (total) girls to qualify for the first national championship race in school history. Yet one simple tick keeps appearing through every runner I coach. I've never stopped thinking "care about #29". That has now become my coaching motto. I think it's a good rule for life too. So many people only pay attention to the 1 or 2 people leading the races. Yet no one notices the hard work that the guy in last is putting in. His lack of ability in that specific element does not disqualify his worth or usefulness. 

I know this story is about not showing favorites, but truthfully I have coached 2 favorite runners. The first was a kid that we coached to 3 individual state championship races. The second was dead last on our team, running in the 30's just like me. He's dropped well over 10 minutes so far. He gave me a card when I moved on to college coaching, thanking me for caring about the kid in dead last, because most people don't.

I still remember that every day of life. 

Care about #29.

- Coach Seth (@thesethrinehart)