Not bad. Some guy checked me into the woods and I have all these seeds on me. But I got 19:58. So woo!

Awful race. Threw up. Barley finished. 166th place. 20:24 Bah

20:22. Not half bad. I ran a beast race. 8th on the team and my ankle was okay during the race but it hurts now.

Gimpy. Ms. Storie called me gimpy :( i'm not gimpy. Pout

I'm So Far Ahead

This is annoying. I'm so far ahead in APUS that I don't have any more homework I can possibly do. I'm so far ahead in economy, I don't have anything else I can do. The only class I'm not ahead in is algebra, and if I could, I probably would be. I haven't had homework for the past 2 nights. I went back and started to re-read The Ballard of Jim Shelley, cause I don't have a book with me, and I'm bored out of my mind. But I figure I might as well blog. Hmmm...about the race yesterday?

Yesterday was the first race in a long time I had been nervous. I never really got nervous once I started racing in high school. I remember once in track this year at Allen Johnson I was pretty nervous, but it all wiped away within split seconds of the gun going off. It held with me the entire race. I was shaking on the line, even though I knew we would crush the other teams. As the gun went off I expected the adrenaline burn to go away and my body to feel light as a feather...like it always does. But it didn't. That burn was still there, and I was still worried sick. I tried to hang on to the pack for about the first mile, and I kept second guessing my self. Maybe they're going out slow, and I'll be screwed in the end. Maybe I'm going out too fast. Until I slowly but surely dropped to the back on the pack. After the first loop of the course, I had grown accustomed to the burning sensation, and realized it wasn't going to go away. I tried to charge up the little rise on to the soccer field, but that damn blister on my toe cut open and started bleeding. Or I assume that's where it did.

I really lost the pack at that point. I dropped behind DV-S and the rest of the pack, and barely managed to hold my own against some lee kids. My nerves were psyching me out. I had that constant burn, and I kept trying to slow my self down. I think the only thing that really snapped me out of it was that voice that I hear at every race, spurring me on. I think if it hadn't been for Mrs. Todd I would have been screwed that race. I may not have listened to her advice for once in my entire career, but she gave me the needed boost. Coming down the hill of the tennis courts I started to prepare my self to hit the hill. Then...hey wait a second. Oh dammit! We have to go around the fence. I flat out got annoyed there, and tried to surge down the hill, and up to Banksta and DV-S. Unsuccessfully unfortunately, and when I hit the hill, I wished I hadn't taken that little surge. I couldn 't force my muscles to work any harder. Even with Mrs. Todd shouting encouragements, I couldn't bring my self to do it. When I topped that hill, it was all I could do to keep running.

I took Bair's advice and took 7 surging steps over the top of the hill and gained considerable distance on two of the guys trailing me. In an attempt to prepare for the next hill, I slowed my turn over, and lengthened my strides out, trying to catch my breath. Then I hit the two mile and heard 14:17. Oh Hell no I though. No way no way no way am I going that slow. I sped up my turn over, and went into race mode. Charging up the hill and surging over the top of it into the woods. The second I hit the trail, the wood chips gave out and I slid a considerable distance off the trail. Without even bothering to check the cuts on my legs, I made a bee line to the next part of the trail, and took the last 2 runners between DV-S Banks and me. Surging out of the woods, I held onto the back on DV-S and Banks, trying to take a seconds break, and when the hill turned down I took off. Kyle slapped me on the back, and yelled encouraging things at my back, spurring me further ahead. Until I was flying down the hill, purple and sky blue rushing beside me. I managed to catch 4 people on the down hill, and when I looked back up, I saw another navy blue jersey.

This is my lucky day I though for a second. Before taking off in a mini surge towards Bani and the 3 guys between us. Coming down the short dip I took one of them, and then up onto the baseball field, I took another. And when I finally got to Bani, that nervous feeling hit harder than ever. What if he's baiting me, I thought. And then that famous pre quote that Eric Clopper managed to mangle floated across my mind, and I took Bani and the remaining Waynesborro guy beside him. Charging up the hill and dumping everything I had into that last 50 meters. Which didn't happen to be much. As I crossed the line, I was handed a 16th place card. Yes I thought, 16th again, and hey....wait a second...I was 9th....I beat two people on the team....yes!!! I managed to pull out 7th on the team. Varsity.

Not half bad. I still don't know my time, and I won't know until friday. But I'm feeling pretty good about that race. Although I really felt it this morning when I tried to get out of bed. My calves were aching, like I'd run up a bunch of hills or something. Hmm must have been some crazy dream.

The Wall

Todays meet went...better than planned I guess. I'm still not satisfied. At all. I feel like crap actually. I put everything into that race, although I could have done more in the last mile, and my body aches all over to prove it. But for what? I got a 21:24. Grrr.... That makes me 9th on the team behind Bryant, Dan, Keith, Andy, Hayden, Bani, Parker, and Kyle. I guess the fact that it was 95 degrees out didn't really help. I ran a 6:02 first mile, and my second was something along the lines of that, but my third must have been really slow. I still managed to place 16th out of the "developmental" race. What the hell is developmental? That sounds like an insult more than anything. When I finished, it was so hot it felt like the oxygen was like...evaporating out of my lungs, and I couldn't get enough air, and my head started hurting really bad. For a second I couldn't see, and then I fell into some shade, and the effects diminished....somewhat. Anyway, it sucked. The girls team did really good, with two of their freshmen coming in like...top 25. Maria -my forensics parter- got something like 18. In the varsity race. Jesus.

Musings of a Bored Zach

Damn...I hate this keyboard. But hey, I'm on lesson 7 out of 10 on economy. Yeah... I know, I slowed down. I'm only doing 1 per day now. They still haven't graded any of my tests, and I don't have access to the midterm -which is 3 lessons behind me- because they haven't graded any of my tests. And as of right now, I am incapable of logging in. It's rather annoying. I guess the site is just messed up. The whole thing is really slow. So...today is picture day. Ewww. I hate picture day. I hate pictures actually, and I hate people taking pictures of me. Jesus, the login page still hasn't loaded.

Did I write about XC yesterday? I don't think I did, but I'm too lazy to go and check. XC sucked. It made me hate running. We had to run up that beast of a hill 5 times minimum and 9 max. I was hurting after 3 and dead at 5. When I walked up to coach he was like "did you do 6?"
"what are you crazy? no. 5"

"Go do one more."

"what?!"

"one more"

Grrr.... I turned around and threw all my energy at the hill. Yeah. That lasted about 10 second out of 80. By the time I hit the top my muscles were all going "fuck you brain you get down here and work!" and it was all like"Just 10 more meters!" That was unpleasant. When I got to the top just ahead of Jubilee my muscles were all shaking and complaining -they actually didn't stop till I went to bed-. And Bair told us to run down, get a drink, and meet him at the hill. Oh hell no I thought, he isn't that crazy....is he? I was feeling slightly relieved when we got out. Not strides....but hey...hey wait....we're walking towards that hill. Hey stop we're getting too close. Hey wait a second lets talk about this.
'Bair...hey coach....we're getting uh...we're getting a little close to that hill." Dan said
"I'm here to prove a point" Bair said

"You don't need to prove a point, we got it!' said Dan

"Now we're going to run about a third of the way up this hill, 2 times, and the first time, you're going to run with your head down, and your arms behind your back, and the second with your arms pumping and your head up."

It took all of the no longer remaining energy in my muscles to push my self up the hill, especially with the handicap of my arms behind my back and my ead down. I hit the top -well...the middle rather- and just had to tell my self one more. I didn't even feel that last one, I just did it. When we were all grouped at the top, coach told us to just take a cool down lap around the school.
"that's more than I can do" I muttered under my breath. I stood at the top -the middle rather- of the hill just trying to find the energy somewhere in my body. Bair came up to me, and was like "hey you look done for the day."

"hah... I was done a long time ago." I replied, and he laughed

"that's good enough for now, go in and stretch, and if you're aching go to the trainer and whirlpool."

I didn't even have the energy to go to the trainer, I just called my mom, and laid down on his floor.


That's my story. We're running at the farm today. Hopefully we'll just run the course because that's easy. GAH!! I still can't log in! Come on. Humph... I have APUS today. At least that's a good class. I have...3 good classes and one bad. Algebra is bad. Grrr... But AP and event production, and economy are good. Well, as good as school gets that is. So I just got my picture taken, and I look so stoned. It's amusing. She wouldn't take the picture till I smiled, but I can't smile, so she made me hold that fake smile, and on three I just dropped it. Look just like I do every year. Stoic. And stoned. I've given up on Economy for now. I think I'm just going to read...or something to amuse my self. Today is wednesday....so I have forensics practice tomorrow....and I also have event production. Oh yeah...I planned that one. So I can actually eat lunch.

I like this tomb. I'm actually going to keep that typo. I like this room. Mainly because it's empty. Well except for Andrew, but he doesn't count. No one ever walks in here, or disturbs me, or anything. It's great. Except when I start towards Algebra. It drives me crazy having to fight through the crowds of people. Too bad next semester will be like a normal year. Latin, Chemistry, English, and AP/Event. Hmm...know what else is good about this room? These computers...except they keyboard. They are staff computers...so none of the crap restrictions you get on student ones. You can even access some of the banned websites. Some.

Anyway, I'm going to go read.

We Won

Again. Although just barely. We're bound to lose sometime this year.

Xc time trail sucked. I ran a 23:12.... although last year I did like a 28:30...so that's not bad. I'm still 9th on the team. That means William and Mary. Wooo and I was sick. So I'm hoping it'll get better.

You know? I love driving around with Andy.

Humph!

Today was supposed to be a nice and easy 7 miles. Nice and easy, I was hanging back. Prefering not to put my self in pain, when Grizz ran up behind and was like why are holding back Fichter? So I decided to run with him. Frickin' idiot. He said he's going to run with me on the time trial too. : p
Anyway...I feel better than I would have expected. And I got to call Nat for the second night in a row. Yay.

My internet shuts off at 11:00, so that's why this is so short.

It's Been A Day

My lesson was pretty good as usual. I learned quite a bit about my amp, and guitars, and more about soloing. XC was absolutely awful. I got heat exhaustion again, or maybe just dehydration. Anyway... I just ordered my self a new set of pickups, I'm pretty excited.

Well

No matter how much I love rain, it annoyed me a little today. For that fraction of a second after THOR went off I thought "fucking rain." And then immediately apologized and ran out to play in it. We missed Nippleball because THOR is stupid, but we got off with only a 30 minute run. I had a pretty boring day... I was up till 4 last night Talking -I'm going to keep that random capitalization for no reason- to Nat. I was informed that I have a nasty cracked tooth...and I'll need to get it repaired. Umm...holy shit it's 1:30. I should be in bed, but I'm not. I am kind of hungry though.... but I don't want to go downstairs. Grrr... time to go back to talking....more.

Second Day

Well, it took till the second day before I decided I wanted to quit.

But don't worry.

I'm not going to.

First Day

Today was the first day of practice I managed to haul myself to at 6 in the morning. Although I tried yesterday....but no one was there. This is the first time in about 5 years, that on the first day of practice I haven't wanted to quit outright. Of course I choose the day we have a workout as my first day. For a long while I was sticking with the lead pack. Bair, Goldie, Banks, And Dan, but when the actual workout started I dropped behind. What can I expect, they've all been at practice for almost 2 weeks now. Goldie and I went out and got slurpees at 7/11 right after practice, and sat in his car listening to Tenacious D and Queen and all manner of weird bands. Until a thuggish guy got out of his old car, with dread locks and bright red clothes, glared at us, and walked inside. That's when we decided it may be time to go.

Practice left me pretty tired, andI've tried taking a nap today but I can't seem to fall asleep. I had actually slipped out of consciousness when the bloody phone rang. With a curse I threw off my covers and went to answer it. It was the newstreak asking me what I did this summer. Still slightly dazed I responded. Went to camp. And she stammered for a second, then asked where, and proceeded to ask my questions. It was over in a flash, and I stood there with the phone buzzing in my ear. Grr... back to bed.

But I can't sleep.... so I'm sitting here. Listening to what Ben and I did yesterday. Not bad....


www.purevolume.com/zachben