A few weeks ago Noah and Campbell participated in a walk-a-thon at their school. They both took it seriously but Noah and his buddies took it super seriously. Instead of walking they ran to get the most laps possible. Noah was able to knock out 16 laps, 4 miles, in the allotted 35 minutes. Campbell did 11 laps or almost 3 miles!
Of course, he was stoked because so many parents were asking him if he ran much. The truth is Noah doesn't run much but between swimming and simply playing I can't imagine many kids being in better shape cardiovascular wise. One parent, in particular, asked him if he was going to run cross country...and of course he had no idea what cross country was.
So after a Google search, he both knew what cross country was and that a huge cross country race was coming to town in 2 weeks. He has been dead set that he wants to do a triathlon and dad dropped the ball and missed signing him up for the Bentonville MS Trifest last month. Dad was not going to fail again.
So I signed him up and since it would be his first race and needed someone to do it with him, I went ahead and signed up for it as well. Wait! Did I say I signed up for it? I totally meant, I signed Jenna up for it as well. Phew!
He was really nervous. Mamaw and Papaw were here and Papaw gave him a lot of advice about running his race and ignoring the pace of others. The plan was Jenna was going to pace him at 9-minute miles for the first 2 miles and then let him just run as hard as he could the last mile.
Well, the gun went off and he left her. He didn't full sprint out but he wasn't jogging with his momma either. At the first viewing area he came through looking strong and he was easily 2 minutes ahead of Jenna. At the second viewing he was so far ahead of her I didn't think we'd see her before he got to the finish so I booked it over there to see him finish in 23.56!!! The boy ran 7 1/2 minute miles on average! I'm not sure who was more proud, us or him. Truth be told it may have been his sister. She can't wait to run next year.
