Being the fastest kid in middle school must be a great feeling. However, I have no idea. That title fell to a friend of mine, George Kochman. In fact, a few times I was not even the second or third fastest kid in my class at St. Leo's in Lincroft. I was not a great runner in middle school, but I was lucky enough to be on a great team. Practice for us revolved around a mile warm-up, some long jumping, maybe a few baton passes (Lord knows that 4 guys running 15 second 100m dashes need to work on making the passes smooth), some orange slices to ward off any potential exhaustion and a 400m warm down for good measure (it seems even at 12 and 13 I knew how to pad the mileage with junk).
I played a number of different sports while in middle school. They all were great fun, except track. But, I enjoyed track and XC. (Does that make sense?) The competition days were a mixed bag of incredible nervousness and excitement. At times it seems those feelings are interchangeable. My race plan at that age was a blank slate. Gun goes off and you run fast. That was as far as my pre-race musings went. I guess the eventual plan was to just die less than everyone around me. The motivating factor there was the team. This focus on the group rather than the individual would come in handy on the next team I would run for: CBA.
Middle school is a great place to discover and fall in love with a sport. It is also a great place to develop irreconcilable differences with that same endeavor. Our sport is one that constantly has demands. It places demands on your spirit just as much as on your physical well-being. Running, to a great extent, is a solitary act. Too much time alone running cannot be a good thing for a brand new teen. Add in some hard red miles of workouts, a sprinkle of pressure, and wallah! You have yourself a former track star. I was lucky enough to not have to deal with this. The third fastest kid in class does not have to carry burdens like these.
But as a 14 year old, the last thing that I wanted to do in high school was run. And to run for CBA was an absolute no-no. The idea of running everyday was appalling to me. I ran 3-4 miles a week during track at St. Leo's. At least half of those were on the playground at lunch. I had an older brother run for CBA. I knew they were doing more than 3 or 4 miles a week. Case closed, I was trying out for hoops.
In hindsight it seems inevitable that I became a runner. I loved to compete. I loved the war that took place once the race began. What I did not enjoy was the drilling for battle. I did not enjoy what it took to be more than the second or third fastest kid in class. Yet, when my past was my present there was no running in my future. I was going to spend the summer before high school dribbling with my left hand.
So, I got my free throws down. Every morning I worked on my jumper and every night my crossover. Running never left the back of my mind though. It was there; always there. As hard as I tried to dismiss it I could not shake the memory of those moments right before and right after a race. The rubber legs before the gun and the concrete ones after. It was that electrifying pain I remembered. Basketball never did that for me. Still, that first day of school I walked through the front doors sure of two things: I wanted to go to CBA but I did not want to run for them.
He's married to Tammie with two incredible kids, Jack age 3 and Maggie age 1.