It was the week before the PG County Relays before the sprinters first went outside at practice. Spring had come upon us swiftly and the cold bitter dampness that made my muscles raw and aggravated the shin splints, mellowed into warm breezes and sunny skies. We'd moved outside the first nice day and never had to retreat back into the gym.

We never had a formal entry into the world of outdoor track & field that year, because we thought those first few days of warmth were a fluke and they'd soon pass and we'd be driven back inside. They didn't and Whitey started leading the entire team in exercises after the team meetings each day. Little else changed except we had more room to roam.

The weather had stayed cool well into April last season. There were the occasional nice days but they usually gave way to a renewed winter's cold that dominated the first half of the season. Once spring made an appearance my junior year, it was like turning a switch and winter was over except for a few stormy days that winter left behind as a reminder that it was never far away.

The baton hadn't come out until we got outside. We were well acquainted with it and the science it represented. We were well aware that we would need to recapture our timing but we were familiar enough with one another that it wouldn't be a problem. We walked on the track together, talked, and even lounged on the small patches of infield grass between wind sprints that were held to accustomize our muscles to speed. Little had changed. None of us ever opened up on our track or on the infield. We would dash off, testing our muscles, and easing our speed down to match conditions that were less than perfect by quite a bit.

Toward the end of that first beautiful week, we ran through the baton exchange between the goalposts and then in front of the bleachers starting down where Beaudreault kept his block so he could practice his starts. It felt good. I felt strong and we were ready by the time the Prince George's Relays were a few days away.

I no longer feared failure. I'd done it enough times to know I could do it and there were no questions about Droter, who handed me the baton, or Whitey, who took it from me. Beaudreault's aversion to the baton exchange had passed. There were no arguments or complaints issued. He practiced with us until we were all satisfied with what we were doing and then Beaudreault went back to practicing his starts.

I couldn't help but wonder if his new attitude might have something to do with his injury the year before or if it was strictly a matter of resignation. It was easier to go along with a program than it was to struggle against it. Whatever it was, I was glad for the peace that had come to our relay team. It allowed me to enjoy the experience and to look forward to the first competition, where we'd find out if we were running together or not.

None of us mentioned the adversity of the year before. We'd been denied an opportunity to run head to head against the fastest teams because they didn't recognize the county record we'd set in Baltimore County the week before. The fastest team from Prince George's County had been relegated to the slow heat, where we ran away with the race, but only finished third overall, because the faster teams all ran against each other, except for us.

While licking our wounds to the tune of wait until next week, Beaudreault pulled his hamstring in his very next race, and any idea that we would show them our heels in the near future was lost. What had been a raw deal in one event turned into misfortune for the team right before our eyes. Just when we believed, things can't get any worse, they did. Our sprint relay team never ran together again, until now, and we seemed to be ready to pick up where we'd left off, although I found myself watching Beaudreault's stride and I tried to measure the strength in his legs with my eyes more than once.

We had no way of knowing if we could have won that race if we had been able to run head to head against the two teams that finished with better times in the fast heat. It's an accepted hypothesis that the faster the competition the faster the result. Like in most sports, when you face the best team you play your best game. I suppose it is human nature and it is also human nature to want another shot at the guys that beat you without ever running against you.

These facts were on my mind and I was sure on the minds of my teammates. We believed in ourselves. We knew we could work together. We knew we won when we did work together. What we didn't know was how good we were or if we ran head to head in the fast heat if we were good enough to win, but we would soon find out and that was the only pressure I felt as we approached our first track meet.

There was no talking of winning and losing, only technique and timing. I was aware that I was running with some pretty terrific sprinters and I was glad for the opportunity. I watched them as they neared graduation. This gave me one more thing to worry about. After track season ended my guys were leaving me behind. We got one more shot at running together and then it was over.

I wanted to make the most of it, but it wasn't about winning and losing. That was never the issue for me. Doing something to the best of my ability and doing it with guys I admired and trusted appealed to me in a way nothing had before. It took some time for me to recognize what it was that had kept me on the team last season, but it had been a search for something worth finding. Finding it in sports, in competition, was surprising but undeniable.

The experience had been worth having and the fact we'd come up short made this year's experience even more appealing. I felt like we could do whatever we set out to do. What was it Coach Becker had said to us at Catonsville, "Any time you boys step on the track together you are a threat to set a record." That appealed to me, setting a record, not beating one. Setting it with my guys. Being part of that.

As there were juniors and seniors who could have taken my place in my sophomore year, there were even more juniors and seniors that wanted to sprint my junior year. I was confident that the combination of my speed and experience earned me the spot on the team I'd held since my first track meet.

I believed Coach Becker knew what he was doing when he put us together and then stuck with us as we tried to resist the prospects of running with three other guys, especially when those three other guys were temperamental and hard headed, not to mention sprinters. When the smoke cleared, we were "The Team" he created in his head and we were now ready to run and to run together.

The other sprinters who longed to be a part of that team were shut out. None of them had the speed to challenge Whitey or Beaudreault for their spots in the open sprints and none had the experience we had when it came to running the relays, and Coach Becker thought the year of running together would pay off in performance as we entered competition. His confidence in us showed when he didn't spend nearly as much time with us as last year. There were no questions about what we were to be doing and if any of us seemed in doubt, Whitey was quick to set us straight.

Beaudreault didn't go near his starting block when it wasn't coordinated with baton exchanges. Only after we'd exhausted our practice together as a relay team did he go down to isolate himself with the art of the start. I was sure Beaudreault used his starting block to keep himself away from us during the first half of last season. He didn't seem interested at all in the relay. Once the pieces started coming together, he had begun putting off his lonely practice until the end of practice and many days when I was leaving he was still practicing his starts.

Coach Becker once told me that Beaudreault's starts were very good at first, so it proved to me hard work paid off. He knew what he was doing and he did it as well as anyone he faced that year. I no longer watched him as I had my first year out of curiosity, I now watched him out of admiration and gratitude that his dedication paid off for our relay team. Beaudreault rarely took a start when he didn't get us the lead and that was key to what we wanted to prove.

I kept my eyes on my guys as we worked out. It was obvious that they were more poised and confident. Even when we practiced separately, I would watch them ignite their speed in those short bursts, burning up the track and then calling it off before attracting any attention.

Since someone had graciously dumped a truckload of cinders onto our cinder barren track prior to the season, and we had been enlisted to spread them out one Saturday. This effort created a smooth section of track where we could actually open up without risking our legs to the ruts and craters, the product of too many winters without repairs being made.

There weren't enough cinders to do the entire front stretch but there were enough to smooth out most of a hundred yards right in front of the bleachers where Beaudreault practiced his starts and at times the relay team practiced the handoff. It made for easier and less dangerous practices. After each session with the baton, we'd sit on the infield to discuss what we'd done. There were no more conflicts. We all knew what to do and what to expect. In my mind we were ready to see what we could do.

Coach Becker did find a way to make practices less than perfect by calling me over to the starting blocks a couple of days before the first track meet. My shin splints were relatively benign in the warm weather but getting into, and testing my legs against the starting blocks, never failed to ignite them for the rest of practice, requiring long hot showers and ample applications of Atomic Balm to calm them back down.

I made every effort to avoid eye contact with the Coach if he loitered near the starting blocks for any length of time and these were the only times when the urge to run a cross country struck, so I'd be out of his line of sight. It would have been far easier just to confess my weakness to him but I was sixteen and not much at confessing anything to anyone. The downside of confession and the biggest part of the unknown was, I was afraid he'd yank me out off the relay if he thought I was injured, and I wasn't injured, I just had shin splints that always lurked just below the surface.

On those days he did catch me he would give me instructions on how best to exit the iron version I was relegated to using. Only Beaudreault and Whitey used the aluminum version so the rest of us didn't destroy it.

By the time of the first track meet, Beaudreault Scherer had set the school record about three different times. Most of the team found their way to the high jump pit at one time or another to watch our phenomenon jump. What a difference a year makes. We'd gone from also-ran to contender in the high jump in a month. Although the Prince George's County Relays was not the place to show him off. It required four participants in each event and then you added all four performances together and divided by four to get your final score in a field event. Coach Becker and Beaudreault Scherer spent a lot of time recruiting three other guys to make it a competition. I was surprised at the number of volunteers. We'd simply sent no one to the high jump pit at the same event the year before, zeroing out that event as was usual.

The ride over to Northwestern wasn't as chaotic as most of the rides we'd taken as a team the year before. There was more maturity in the team and in the leadership. Whitey started out sitting next to Coach Becker and discussing the days events. He drifted back to the rear where the sprinters always sat, and he napped for a few minutes. Nothing got to him.

This was my best track meet. There was nothing but relays and that's all I ran. We'd get to see what we could do at full speed for the first time. It would be our first performance since Beaudreault was injured. There were a lot of things to be examined but my nerves weren't as edgy and I was ready to run.

The previous year it had been overcast and too cool for my taste. This time it was partly cloudy and warm with the sun shinned between the big easy moving fluffy clouds that filled the sky. Most of us left our sweats on the bus and I used mine to wipe off the Atomic Balm so my shins wouldn't glow orange. One thing hadn't changed, we all stopped at the wide open gate that gave us access to Northwestern's fine facility. Most of the team had never seen it before. I had and it was every bit as impressive as I remembered. We'd had three track meets there the year before.

While the complex hadn't changed, we had. When we stopped to get the big picture, we weren't stopping as intimidated guests of a powerful host. We stopped in search of our prey to let him know we had arrived. After our initial halt, we stepped across the threshold and moved into the arena and took our place in the furthest corner of the bleachers.

There was no grab ass or wisecracking remarks. Everyone was serious and ready to compete. While this track meet was right up my alley, it still required more men than we had to offer. Only Northwestern and High Point had the numbers that it took to prevail in a relay track meet. I had a different feeling than the one I had the year before. I was no longer in the dark about what a track meet was and what the third leg of a relay team did. Some of the newer guys did ask questions and the scoring at a relay track meet was discussed.

Coach Becker had us prepared to the best of his ability and now it was up to each of us to perform to the best of ours. We'd be competitive in every event, since the pole vault wasn't contested here. There were never enough pole-vaulters to score the event. It was the one event we couldn't compete in at all and so that ruling was fine with Suitland.


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