FOR A LITTLE more than three months I’ve been used to running for two hours after school every day, sometimes running in the morning as well, preparing for pretty much one thing only: the Illinois High School Association Class 1A state cross country meet Nov. 3 in Peoria.

Our team placed third at sectionals on Oct. 27, qualifying us to advance to state as one of the top 20 teams in Class 1A. On the boys side, junior Malcolm Taylor qualified for state individually.

As November began, the journey we started in August was about to come to an end.

For me, a first-year member of the team, state would be a new experience. But for the rest of our varsity, this was familiar territory; last year the Uni girls had come in fourth.

GETTING READY

On the day before the state meet, my teammates and I left for Peoria along with Taylor and his alternate, senior Austin Rundus. We left Uni during lunch and got there without too much trouble, stopping only at Jimmy John’s to pick up sandwiches, which resulted in a fairly disgusting van.

Instead of dropping off our things at the hotel first, we headed straight to the 3-mile course at Detweiller Park to get a quick practice in.

Despite the fact that the meet wasn’t until the next day, the course was packed with people, some from the meet crew, but mostly runners and their coaches.

Coach Doug Mynatt told us to run 2 miles and then come back to do five 100-meter sprints. We decided to run the first 2 miles of the course.

As we ran (very slowly) we picked out points on the course where we would do certain things; for example, we picked out a tree, “the death tree,” where you had to pass somebody, or else.

Doing the 100s was a little difficult since people weren’t watching where they were walking.

Every couple seconds somebody walked out in front of us, made us wait for them as they yelled to their team, did the hokie-pokie, checked all their cell-phone messages from the past year, made a daisy chain, and then they finally, FINALLY realized that we were glaring at them, and not the vast expanse of brown grass behind them.

“Oh, sorry!” they would yell, and then saunter off to annoy the runners in the next starting box.

Once we were done with our mini-workout we had time to go buy shirts, sweatshirts, or other various items.

The lines were ridiculously long — I waited 15 to 20 minutes to buy a shirt. After finally getting our things, we wandered around the other stalls, looking at the spikes, bags, track jackets, posters, and old uniforms they had for sale.

Pretty soon, however, we had to head back to the car, so that we could get back to the hotel.

After spending about 10 minutes trying to get out of our parking space (the road was packed), we headed up the winding road out of the park. We drove to the hotel, unpacked, and went out to dinner at an “Italian” restaurant.

It was full of other teams trying to get tables, so we had to wait for about 45 minutes to get our table. While Doug and assistant coach Katrina Watry stayed inside the restaurant, we stayed in the van taking pictures, yelling loudly, and generally being obnoxious.

When we got home later that night, we had a meeting with Doug, and we were given numbers to pin on our uniform: one on the front, one on the back, two stick ones to put in the left and right side of our shorts, and one for each shoe. The meet people weren’t taking any chances with missing times.

Doug also told senior Michelle Mehnert that Illinois Prep Top Times had ranked her 15th in the state going into the finals, even though she had placed seventh at state last year and showed no signs of slowing down this season.

This was just the latest bit of motivation for Michelle to improve on her 2006 performance. Earlier in the week Doug had agreed to let Michelle shave his head if she finished in the top five.

MEET DAY

My alarm went off at 6, waking me up from a dream where instead of wearing team uniforms, you were given a uniform that was covered in your number. Happy to see that my dream was only partly true, I started get dressed to head out to the course.

Though the meet would only start at 9, we decided to go at 7, so that we would have more time to warm up and a better chance to find a good site for our tent.

We got to the course, and after walking around shivering for a while we decided to warm up. In the 15 to 20 minutes we were running, almost all of the other teams had arrived, making it difficult for us to find our tent again.

After what seemed like only a few seconds, Doug was telling us that we had to get to our box to get ready. When we got there, we started taking off sweats and putting on spikes, nervously awaiting the arrival of the meet officials, who would tell us whether the way we were wearing our uniforms was OK.

When they came they checked all of the numbers on each person (which, with the insane amount of numbers we were wearing, took a very long time). They made sure we had no clips or bobby pins in our hair (so that we couldn’t stab anyone on the course), and they made us tuck in our uniforms.

Finally all the teams were ready, and the meet officials told us how the start was going to work. There was a whistle, followed by the head meet official saying, “Mr. Starter, the race is in your hands.”

The gun went off, and we were gone, racing across the field that had seemed so huge just minutes before.

I don’t remember much of the race, other than my managing to pass someone at the death tree, and my finish. The finish is an extremely long, wide path uphill, with excited spectators screaming on either side. As I started the last 200 meters to the finish, I gained on a pack of about 10 girls, eventually passing them.

The multiple blue mats, set out to record your time, beeped as I stepped on them, telling me that my time had been officially registered.

Once I had passed all the mats, I — along with all the runners who had finished close to me — was herded into a corral-like area where we were given water and Gatorade. A lot of girls started throwing up around me, and I was thankful for the large number of trashcans.

It was hard to find Doug and Katrina and the rest of my teammates after leaving the finish area, mainly because all the parents had congregated there so that they could congratulate their kids and the other runners from their team.

Overall we came in ninth out of 20 teams, while Michelle finished third out of 167 runners, the highest placing ever by a Uni cross country runner at state, male or female.

It didn’t seem like a very long time until Malcolm had finished his race, which began at 10. Malcolm placed 29th out of 165 runners, just four spots away from making all-state, an honor that goes to the top 25 finishers.

About an hour later, we cheered for Michelle at the awards ceremony, discussed shaving Doug’s head, and started to head home.

We stopped for lunch at a place called the Spotted Cow, where we loaded up on greasy and fatty foods to congratulate ourselves on finishing the season successfully.

My first (but definitely not last) cross country season officially ended with everyone on the bus falling asleep on the way back.

State was a great experience, and I know that I want to go again. From long runs to pasta parties, Panera bagels to turtle vans, cross country has made a huge impact on me.

Allen heads toward a 131st-place finish at the Class 1A state meet. She ran the 3-mile course in 21 minutes, 8 seconds. This was her first year of running cross country. Gargoyle staff (click to enlarge)