Cross-country running, damn, no sport will bring you closer to God, whether you believe in Her or not. – Barker Ajax
Original Gangsters Of Running And Their Cross-Country Experience.
Featuring Jon Anderson, Jackie Hansen, Ron Wayne, Bob Hodge and Anne Audain.
Being a series of conversations about the joys of running through the woods and fields and golf courses of cross-country.
And I’ll tell you why.
Cross Country: No half times, no time outs, no substitutions. It must be the only true sport. – Chuck Norris
OGOR XC (Jon Anderson)
How did you get your start in cross-country?
I started some running late in my junior year of high school to get in shape for the next ski season. Ran an all-comer meet mile in around 5:15 in July after a couple of months. Decided that summer to turn out for XC team at Sheldon HS here in Eugene. Team wasn’t very good and I was the top runner right away. ‘The bit was in my teeth.’
Tell me about that first race?
The first race I recall was at our high school. Dual meet. A very good runner, Jan MacNeal of Thurston, was the winner. I might not have been the top runner for us, but I was at least #2. More indication to me that I had some ability.
What surprised you about the second race?
No recollection of the second. But I do recall our district meet. I failed to make the state meet individually by a few places. Among those ahead of me who made State … Pre, who was either a freshman or sophomore.
Please describe your training (progression) for the season.
The school’s baseball coach was our XC coach for one season … the one I ran. Duane Miller was a fun guy, but knew little about distance running. We did a lot of five-mile runs after school, I think, then some strides. That was about it, if I recall correctly.
What do you consider your greatest XC performance?
Won the Heps (Ivies plus Army and Navy) in 1970, my senior year at Van Cortlandt. Won going away from Tom Spengler of Harvard who had beaten me easily a few weeks earlier in a dual meet in Boston. Tom and I had some good battles on the track, too, but I think he won them all. Two miles was the distance; a bit short for me!
Favorite race or venue?
Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. Ran there a number of times prior to the win in 1970 Heps. If you’ve run the five-mile course, you have time that can be compared to other times of other runners in other past years. Many runners do this. And, it is a good course, with hills in the forest across the highway, and ‘cemetery hill’ in the second lap, which I recall as a helluva climb in the last mile or so. I hope that’s what they still run there. Way too many of today’s courses aren’t even cross country; they’re little more than flat, grass tracks.
Any XC memories you care to share?
Along with the above, I was on the US Cross Country team in 1977. We ran in Dusseldorf. Great trip with great bunch of men and women, seniors and juniors. Course in Germany was on a hippodrome. We went to the Cinque Mulini in Milan area after. Great fun experience. Not very good results, but still good memories.
How important is the team aspect of XC?
VERY! As the captain of our college team senior year, I was “on” the guys in the 4th through 6th or 7th positions to work hard for our team. We liked to finish ahead of other teams.
OGOR XC (Jackie Hansen)
The five S’s of sports training are: stamina, speed, strength, skill, and spirit; but the greatest of these is spirit.
– Ken Doherty
We all had a good laugh at that lack of form.
The photograph of you jumping over that barrier makes this whole project worthwhile.
I am so glad I made it worthwhile. It is seriously funny.
Imagine the next step. With both feet up, the landing had to be a dead stop. No forward motion is possible.
Although I do have long legs for this body, overall I am still short. Not built for the steeple.
How did you get your start in cross-country?
I usually attribute my starting point in training with Laszlo happening in early 1970 track season. However, I met him late in the previous fall season and the first thing he had me do was to join my teammates at a cross country race in Ventura, CA. I presume he was just looking to see what I was made of.
Tell me about that first race?
Mind you, I was such a greenhorn, and I’d never raced anything beyond a 400 or 800m track race, and I did not run all year round, so I was not in good shape. I remember the heat and steep dirt hills. At some point I tripped over my own feet in my fatigue and fell down. If I was hoping to quit, that wasn’t an option. I might’ve heard Laszlo yelling on the sidelines, but I did get up, and struggled to finish.
What surprised you about the second race?
Who knows? I don’t even remember it.
Please describe your training (progression) for the season.
Laszlo [Tabori] trained us similarly no matter the season. It was always filled with intervals. Of course, for cross country, he would let us step away from the track some times to run in parks. He also had us practice running up hill, down hill, and turning corners. He emphasized form in every workout, and cross country meant ever-changing our style and form and pace. Yes, he taught us how to surge, how to pass, how to crest a hill, and so on.
What do you consider your greatest XC performance?
I wouldn’t say I ever had a great performance in cross country. The race was never long enough for me. I performed better if there were a lot of hills, but otherwise, if the course was flat, it went to the milers. Remember, when I started, races were only 1 mile, and grew only to 2 miles by the time I moved on to road races. I believe my best season was when I came close to the top ten at nationals. I was in a very competitive district, which included Mary Decker and Francie Larrieu. Actually I was only third best on my own team, with Judy Graham and Cheryl Bridges ahead of me.
Favorite race or venue?
Mt. SAC. Mount San Antonio College is still classic California cross country. If the rest of the world ran cross country on flat, muddy courses in cold rainy weather, well, we experienced exactly the opposite. Hot, dry weather on dusty, steep, dirt hills. California college coaches have standards for incoming recruits, and it includes times for the Mt. SAC course separate from any other cross country courses.
Any XC memories you care to share?
Cross country nationals always happened on Thanksgiving weekend. I remember a lot of missed turkey dinners with the family. I remember my first nationals in Ohio in the snow. The ground was icy, slushy, and I slipped and fell more than once in the warmup and again on the start line. We had an evil team manager who screamed at me to get up and run (we only had 5 runners to score, and no alternates). My wrist was broken. But I had to finish. I never spoke to that person again.
How important is the team aspect of XC?
Extremely important. I’ve coached high school track and cross country for decades. There is no exaggerating the importance of team spirit, team bonding, and character building.
It’s amazing, because I missed the turn for the finish line and had to turn back (a course monitor missed me).
OGOR XC (Ron Wayne)
We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort. – Jesse Owens.
How did you get your start in cross-country?
I joined the Brockton High (MA) Cross Country Team my junior year to help with my fitness for the upcoming basketball season, a team I had played on in the 10th grade. Also, the new Cross Country Coach, Harry Allen, was the Assistant Varsity Basketball Coach and I thought, if I showed him I had a good work ethic, it might help my chances of making the varsity squad instead of the JV Team.
Tell me about that first race?
Other than being apprehensive and excited, I don’t remember anything noteworthy about my first race. I had to look in my scrapbook to check the opponent and the results. My first race, held on September 20, 1965, was a dual meet against Brookline High School where I placed 5th, 3rd Brockton finisher. My first ever distance workout was August 15, so I had 35 days of training under my belt.
What surprised you about the second race?
My second ever competition, a dual meet against Durfee High School, was only 3 days after my first race and was our first home meet. Nothing sticks out about the race, as once again, I was the 3rd Brockton finisher placing 3rd overall. Prior to racing cross country, I played team sports, baseball, football and basketball. I believe playing these team sports made me extremely competitive and that competitiveness carried over to my cross country race efforts. I was constantly learning pace, race strategy, etc., but I believe my early success was more about a drive to succeed.
The race I do remember most that first season was the Catholic Memorial Invitational which was the 7th race of the year and the first non dual meet with 23 teams in the race. I had never experienced racing over 150 runners at one time. The gun went off and I sprinted across the big grass field at a pace that was much too fast for my fitness. I ended up stopping and walking 3 times the 2nd half the race and when I reached the finish line completely exhausted, I asked myself , “why am I doing this” and I thought about never racing again. I guess the mind does not have a long memory because I went for a training run the following day like nothing negative had ever happened.
Please describe your training (progression) for the season.
Unfortunately, 25 years ago, when I moved to my current house, I trashed my high school training log – what a mistake because I currently support my high school cross country team discussing my high school training and racing experiences. M weekly training mileage ranged from 28-40 miles a week. Training with teammate, Ed Norris, who won the Class A (big schools) Massachusetts State Cross Country Championship that year, the pace was always very fast (sometimes sub 6 pace). For the most part, the team trained on our home cross country course in D.W. Field’s Park. Sometimes we did a workout where we ran single file on the race course and the last person would speed up to take the lead for a period of time.
Our course, which was on the roads, was adjacent to a golf course and one of the holes had a steep long hill called tower hill. I used to go tobogganing down it in the winter. We sometimes ran sprints up this long steep hill. The first time I did repeat sprints up the hill my calf muscle cramped. When we got back to the locker room, I was told to take salt pills. Sometimes when we trained from our locker room, we ran up the street about a mile and a half and did a fartlek type workout sprinting every other side street, as we progressed back towards the school.
On one of those workouts, I got bit by a dog causing a big hole in my baggy cotton sweatpants. I got a piece of white athletic tape, wrote “dog bite” on it and attached it to my sweats.
Our high school cross country races were 2.5 miles or less and the furthest I ran in training was 6 miles. One factor that affected training was we raced a lot. One stretch, we raced 8 times in 22 days and for the year had a total of 14 races in just over 8 weeks . Almost every week, we raced twice every 3 days and once we had 4 races in 8 days. As a result, we raced ourselves into shape, more than anything else. I never ran more than once a day. This low mileage, high intensity pace worked, as the following year the team tied for the MA State Championship and won the New England Team Title and I won the MA State Class A Championship and the New England Championship.
What do you consider your greatest XC performance?
In high school, I would say it was my entire senior season. In less than fifteen months of running distance, I went undefeated winning all 14 races that included the prestigious Catholic Memorial Invitational held on the state meet course in Franklin Park, the League Meet, the MA State Class A Championship and the New England Championship. To this day, I am still puzzled about how this could possibly have happened after being so new to the sport?
In addition to winning the New England High School Cross Country Championship, I also won the New England Collegiate Cross Country Championship breaking the meet record held by Art Dulong. In the past 110 years, only 3 other runners have ever won both the New England High School and New England Collegiate Cross Country Championships. My senior years in both high school and college, I went undefeated in New England winning a total of 21 races.
Favorite race or venue?
Located about a half mile from my house, my favorite venue was my high school home cross country course run all on the roads in D.W. Field’s Park. After a flat two tenths of a mile, one had to run up a steep hill (Tower Hill) for about two tenths of a mile, after which the course was a gradual downhill with some flat for about 2 miles around a lake which brought you back to once again run the same steep up hill and then to the finish line about 50 yards past the top of the hill.
Being a very good uphill runner, I used the hill to my advantage usually reaching the top first. It was a very scenic course with the lake always to the left and for the most part was tree lined the entire course. When I lived at home during high school and the summers while in college, about 90% of my training was in this park that also included dirt trails.
Any XC memories you care to share?
One of my UMass Teammates, Leo Duarte, was from Martha’s Vineyard Island which is located about 7 miles off the coast of Cape Cod. His family owned a second house on the Island in Vineyard Haven, just up the road from the Ferry Terminal. For two weeks prior to start of the cross country season my junior and senior years, the UMass team had a training camp here. We attached a big sign on the front of the house that read UMass Cross Country. One day a couple walking by came over and said, “We go to UMass. Are you traveling across the country?”
We had wall to wall mattresses, went food shopping as a group, and took turns cooking meals for the group. We trained twice a day on the roads or the beaches and even did sprints up the famous gay head sand cliffs. One morning, we did a six mile out and back run on the beach. Prior to our turnaround, we saw a large number of people up ahead. When we reached this section of the beach, we encountered a nudist colony. We figured out the location of this group and drove back later that day and joined in.
Which brings up my final question, which just came to me, how important is the team aspect of XC?
I recently wrote a Facebook post saying cross country is life.
Much of what I wrote pertained to the team aspect of cross country.
CROSS COUNTRY IS LIFE
My Alma Mater, Brockton High, recently opened their cross country season at the Martha’s Vineyard Invitational on Martha’s Vineyard Island which is located about 7 miles off the coast of Cape Cod. The teams had to take a ferry to get to the Island. In Coach John Fidalgo’s race recap, he wrote that it was the first time many of the athletes had ever taken a ferry. This got me thinking about the many benefits of being a member of a cross country team and it goes far beyond lacing up your shoes and running a race.
Cross Country teaches teamwork, camaraderie, discipline, dedication, motivation, planning, hard work, time management, confidence, following directions, goal setting, competition, taking risks, mental toughness, overcoming injuries, dealing with failure and success, etc., etc. etc.
Hats off to Brockton Coaches John Fidalgo, Cliff Canavan and Bret Gormley for teaching life’s lessons to their teams every day. Your guidance is making a significant difference in so many lives.
OGOR XC (Bob Hodge)
“One kid ran right into a small tree branch and nearly decapitated himself. It was awesome.”
How did you get your start in cross-country?
September 1969. I started my freshman year at Lowell High School but only in name; in reality I was physically at the Edith Nourse Rogers School by the South Common and a half mile walk from my home on Butterfield St. in the Acre section of the city. The Edith Nourse Rogers School was taking on the overflow of baby boomer students flooding the main high school building in downtown Lowell. At least they were taking on those students who were not in a college preparatory program. The Sisters at St. Patrick’s where I attended school advised me to this end.
Most of my friends were either going to LHS or some Catholic High School like Keith Academy just across the street coincidently from the Rogers. I felt a bit left out of things when my fellow students were taking entrance exams to different schools and so somehow or other I got the idea in my head that I would take the entrance exam for St. Francis Seminary away out in Andover on the Tewksbury line. I told my Dad and he said “what? You are going to LHS.” Well, in a rare act of rebellion I got up early one Saturday morning and I walked close to five miles to the Seminary School to take the exam.
Afterwards I started walking home and a friend I knew from St Pat’s had his Mom pick me up and give me a ride home. I told them that I had walked out there to take the exam and they laughed and didn’t believe me. Shortly after that I received a letter from the Seminary to say that I had not scored well enough on the test and could not be accepted for enrollment. So, I figured the Sisters were right and my Dad would not have wanted me to go there anyway, so I attended pseudo-Lowell High.
Over the summer and fall I played baseball in the AYO Acre Youth Organization League on the North Common, right outside the door of our tenement house where we had an apartment on the third floor. I was a decent pitcher and threw the ball sidearm, a frightening delivery for batters at the plate. Also, a friend from school who was heading to Keith Academy shared his reading list of books he was supposed to read over the summer. I remember reading Charles Dickens Great Expectations, one of the items on his list. It was a step up from my usual reading of Horatio Alger-type stories about sports heroes, etc.
My eight-year-older brother Billy was a good athlete and coach in multiple sports and he sometimes would challenge me to races on the Common. He would give me a little head start and then blow by me and laugh. Billy, who was drafted into the Army, would be headed to Vietnam around the same time I was starting high school. My four-year-older brother Mike was also a good athlete but not as committed to it as Billy. Mikey liked to chase the girlies.
There was a well-known boxer in our Acre neighborhood named Beau Jaynes. Beau would run around the perimeter of the North Common ,shadow boxing all the live-long day, in Army boots, in the summer heat. A few times my friends and I tagged along behind him for a lap. He would mostly ignore us but now and then he would turn around and throw some punches our way and laugh.
The first day of school I got all dressed up as I had in grammar school where we had to wear a uniform of white shirt, green tie and dark trousers. I was especially proud of my new “wing tip” shoes.
Well, I set off walking to school that day, fell in with other kids doing the same and I immediately began to sense they were all checking me out in my fancy duds. Most of them were wearing jeans and a t-shirt. Some were smoking cigarettes; I got quite an initiation in school that day. This was not going to be anything like grammar school at St. Pat’s. In gym class, where no one changed into appropriate clothing, but just wore their street clothes, we would pick out sides and play baseball. We had an oldtimey gym teacher who noticed my running skill on the base paths in my fancy pants, wing tip shoes outfit. He suggested I go out for the cross country and track teams.
I was flattered he thought I could be a good runner, but I only had a faint idea what cross country running was all about. Another kid in my class was already on the team, so the next day I met him after school and we walked out to Cawley Stadium, about two miles from the Rogers School. I almost quit before I started when I realized I would have to walk that far every day and then go run! That seemed too absurd.
When we got there, the rest of the team had finished practice and the coach had already left. We changed into some running gear, for me cut off jeans and a beat-up pair of sneakers and we did a bunch of 220-yard repeats. Then we showered quickly and walked home.
As I neared home, my baseball coach pulled up in his car and shouted to me that practice that night would be at six. I told him I would be there, but I already knew that if I liked this running thing I was through with baseball, which bored me anyway. The next day we went again to Cawley for practice after school. This time I met Coach John Lang. He wore a fedora and he smoked a pipe. I liked him right away. He explained how the cross-country season was half over and there were just a few competitions left that us newbies could compete in. One would be this coming Saturday at famed Franklin Park in Boston, the Catholic Memorial Invitational. The CMI had a frosh division with a 1.7-mile race. Coach Lang gave me a uniform and some forms to fill out and told me what time to be there on Saturday. I was so excited I ran all the way home carrying all my stuff. What a sap! I’m going to Boston, yea on a bus, yea.
Saturday arrived, and we headed down to Boston for our big adventure. A regular yellow school bus and only half full as we did not have a very big team. Maybe a dozen runners all together. No one spoke much on the way down and I realized everyone was pensive and a bit anxious about the upcoming race. This race would have a huge stampeding field of greenhorns like me and it was going to be war! When we arrived and got off the bus I sort of mimicked the others, as I had no idea what to do. We got our numbers from Coach and pinned them on. Coach Lang said, “jog for ten minutes and then do some striders.” I just did what everyone did.
Soon we lined up in our assigned boxes at the start and before I knew it we were all hurling ourselves out of there. I was scared shitless. The race started up at the entrance to White Stadium and after a few hundred yards we crossed the road to the golf course where we ran a loop around the perimeter and then back across the road to the finish. I ran the whole distance engulfed in a huge pack and was just happy I stayed on my feet. Some unlucky bastards went down and you could hear them cursing. One kid ran right into a small tree branch and nearly decapitated himself. It was awesome.
After our race we hung around and watched the upper classmen run. The guys out in front in those races looked like stallions, they were flying. On the way home, we were quite the lively group, yip yapping like a group of thirteen-year-old girls. I realized I had finished ahead of some kids on my team and Coach Lang told me I did well in my first race. What I did not realize at the time – this was the beginning of a long involvement in running that took me far and wide.
What surprised you about the second race?
Was on our home course Shedd Park Lowell MA. The team we raced from Haverhill had about 30 athletes to our six or seven and while they formed a circle and went through a routine of calisthenics and stretching we sat on some swings in an adjacency playground cracking jokes about them and their little dictators coach.
Please describe your training (progression) for the season.
Zero to maybe 12 miles a week.
I am guessing you picked up the mileage later in your career.
http://bobhodge.us/hodgie-san-1979-training-log/
What do you consider your greatest XC performance?
Third place 1979 AAU Nationals and member of winning team GBTC.
Favorite race or venue?
Franklin Park, Boston. Just a feeling the vibe from the first race there which caught my imagination to the last as a senior citizen.
Any XC memories you care to share?
World Cross Country 1987 Warsaw
My first ever race was a cross country race and through a long and arduous career I always wanted to compete at least once in the World Champs. I competed in the trial race in 1979 in Atlanta, finishing 16th, and in 1984 at the Meadowlands, again finishing 16th. Top nine make the men’s squad.
By 1987 I had spent a decade with athletics as the center of my life and I knew this was reaching and perhaps past its apex. I was now 31, married, we were soon to become homeowners. The gypsy runner was settling in with just a few more opportunities available, looking back in wonder at the whirlwind of a charmed life.
I was now a college coach at the University of Lowell and enrolled in classes toward finishing my undergraduate degree in American Studies. It was a bit strange being back in Lowell, haunting. I had also begun running for a local running club in Lowell; my years of sponsorship with a shoe company club having come to an ignominious end.
I had begun coaching the Women’s Cross Country and Track Teams in the Fall of 1986 and I pointed my running efforts at the International Cross-Country Trials race to be held in February in Dallas TX. I had finished off 1986 running the New England Cross Country Championships and a few local road races.
The highlight for 1986 was a come-from-behind, 6th place finish at Boston in 2:14:50. This was the first Boston with prize money and my last Boston as a racer.
How much?
Since you asked – $8500.00 U.S.
Coaching was enjoyable but challenging; I ran some with the team and fit my runs in around classes and commuting daily from Hopkinton MA to Lowell. As winter set in, I kept my focus on the Trials. I ran some indoor races and road races – nothing spectacular. On my regular evening runs, usually a 6-miler before stopping at Dunkin Donuts for a coffee and snack for the ride back to Hopkinton, I took to leaping over garbage cans and fences and visualizing cross-country.
I had to fund my own trip to Dallas, as my local running club didn’t have the funds and were only interested in the little local Grand Prix Circuit anyway. I figured I would represent Lowell itself, having come full circle from my High School days in the city.
When I arrived in Dallas I was happy to see old New England friends Scotty Graham, Coach Bob Sevene and fellow competitor through many running wars, Dan Dillon. Also, Lynn Jennings, Leslie Welch, writer Joe Concannon from the Globe and Tommy Leonard, temporarily re-located to Texas. Good Karma.
At a pre-race gathering I exchanged pleasantries with some of the stalwarts of USA Cross Country, Pat Porter, Ed Eyestone, Steve Plasencia, et al. I was left feeling a bit like the ancient marathoner at age 31. Perhaps they were wondering what I was doing there. It played on my mind a bit but also, I was becoming locked in. Locked and loaded.
We ran over the course, typical Texas Cross-Country. We were to run up the sides of hills, irrigation ditches likely and leap over makeshift barriers. It was still a hard run if not inspiring. I remember at the pre-race we were told about the drug testing and I worried about the Advil I had taken. Seems laughable to me now what a naïve dimwit I could be.
As I remember, the race went out rather fast and I laid back a bit off the leaders. I felt good the entire way and with Tommy, Joe, Sev and Lynn Jennings urging me on, I finally made a USA XC Team, finishing 6th.
My drug tester escort followed me around, I was packed and ready to head straight to the airport as soon as I could pee and he had agreed to drive me. They had some Coors Silver Bullets in the drug test tent and I asked if it was OK to drink them as I knew I would be peeing instantly with a couple of those bullets in me. I got the green light.
After taking care of business, we headed to the airport. I had to coach a meet the next day at Holy Cross. I was still in my muddy running gear when I got to the airport with Silver Bullets sloshing around inside me. I went to the restroom, put on some civvies and caught my flight. I did it, I made the friggin’ team, holy cow.
I arrived in Boston at midnight, got into my VW Bug, scraped the inside of the windows and shivered my way down the deserted Mass Pike to Hopkinton.
I had only made one other USA team against the USSR in Outdoor Track in 1982, running the 10,000. I had been offered a spot on the Pan Am Team in 1979 but declined, not wanting to run the marathon in July in Puerto Rico.
The World Cross Country was six weeks away in Warsaw, Poland. I was also invited to compete in a second race – the famous Cinque Mulini (five mills) race in Milan, Italy, a week after the Worlds. Our managers for the Men’s Team were old friends, Dave Martin and Joe Vigil. Lance Harter was there for the women.
The weeks passed quickly. Running was going well, then shortly before leaving, I began to fall apart. Sciatica and plantar fascia, two injuries that had plagued me since high school, dogged me. We were told to bring food with us as the supply in Warsaw was not reliable. Really, how much food you gonna pack for a week in Poland?
When we first arrived, and were collecting our baggage at the airport, I chatted with a manager for the Japanese Team, a JAAF Official whom I had met on one of my sojourns to Japan. He mistook me for the team manager and couldn’t believe I was still running! I wanted to say, “hey, I finished 6th at Boston last year, don’t you follow results?” then I realized no one cares who finished 6th anywhere.
Warsaw in March 1987 was a drab place, despite the history. Between hobbling about on my sore plantar, visiting concentration camps and then getting physically ill – probably with some strange bug or the food – I was miserable. My roommate George Nicholas abandoned me after I was retching all night. The team called a meeting and I was relegated to the last starting position in the cue. Runners started front to back, generally on order of finish at the trial race. I was planning to run, regardless if I had to crawl through it.
The morning of the race I got my plantar taped; the therapist on our trip was great and an immense help to me. We went out to the horse race venue and competed nearly 300 strong in the Men’s Senior event. I was engulfed the entire race, legs churning, mud, cursing obstacles that got bigger every lap. It was war and I was in the trenches.
Results https://en.wikipedia.org/…/1987_IAAF_World_Cross_Country_Ch…
I ran poorly and the USA Men were ninth, not a good showing. The women and Juniors ran much better including a few future stars, Todd Williams and Marc Davis.
The next day, some of us left for Rome and then on to Formia, a lovely training center south of Rome. I recovered well that week by the Mediterranean, running twice most days in the lovely hills overlooking the sea.
I also did a two-mile time trial at the track one day with Marc Davis and Mark Mastilair, runners on the Junior team, pacing me for most of it. When I had arrived at the track, they were banging out quarters under 60 seconds. I also heard a bit about the training regimen at Stanford under Brooks Johnson from Mastilair. Yowser.
We also spotted Jamila Kratochlikova – Women’s 400M WR Holder – at the track running intervals. Double yowser.
I was hoping to redeem myself somewhat with a good race at Cinque and I did, finishing 34th. I was 4th place for our team and we finished third behind Kenya and Italy.
I look back fondly now on this entire two weeks’ experience. It was interesting and exciting to be around other athletes, all younger and, of course, Dave Martin and Joe Vigil, who I enjoyed good conversation with at breakfast or in the evenings with a glass of vino.
My fitness came along and just a few weeks after returning I ran 28:29 at Penn Relays, finishing third in my second-best time ever. So, I had a Nationals and Olympic Trials qualifier in the 10,000.
Cross-country strong. Cross-country tested.
OGOR XC (Anne Audain)
“Cross-country taught me patience, adaptability, flexibility in training and calmness.”
How did you get started with cross-country?
I had reconstructive surgery on both feet at age 13 ( I am from New Zealand). One year later I joined the Otahuhu Athletic Club in a suburb of Auckland City. Track season was December-March. XC May-August ( NZ winter) and Road September-November.
My first XC race was 1-mile in Sub-Junior Girls over local farmland. I ran barefoot and won. Instead of climbing the farm fences, I crawled under them. I was very protective of my feet and wouldn’t jump. I won a manicure set!!
Second race?
Held at Cornwall Park in the middle of the city, an extinct volcano, very hilly and a functioning farm, so we ran through paddocks with cows and sheep who had “ right of way!” Rules in NZ allowed me to compete in Senior races, so my first season I raced in Junior and Senior.
Training?
About 30-40 miles a week. Club night was Wednesday and training nights Tuesday and Thursday. Races on Saturday and 8-mile run Sunday. I did not increase mileage until 18 and that was to 50 miles a week. I did not run 80 plus until age 25!
Best XC performance?
9th place at Worlds 1973 at age 17 years. No Junior races at that time.
Favorite venue?
Definitely Cornwall park. Stunningly beautiful and very true XC.
Best memories?
1975 World XC in Rabat Morocco. NZ men won team title and NZ women were second. Most talented team to ever leave NZ. Walker, Quax, Dixon, Ryan , Moller, Roe, Audain, Mathews.
Those were my amateur years, so the 5 Worlds XC I went to (73,75,77,79,81) gave me months of free travel to Europe before the age of 25! NZ Athletics didn’t have much money so we certainly didn’t travel easily. It taught us all patience, adaptability, flexibility in training calmness. That all helped when I turned pro and competed so often yearly, both in NZ and USA.
