coach of champions

the 2012 NCAC cross country championship course,
drawn by Coach Dennis Rice

The Wooster cross country team wouldn't be what it is without Coach Rice. He's been coaching for about 27 years and plans to continue for at least another 40. As a young buck in high school, Coach was already on track for greatness (and presumably people were already calling him "Coach" instead of Dennis). In college, Coach Rice was an All-American runner twice and awesome all the time. His last race was a marathon in which he broke both legs but still finished, he enjoyed a post-long run meal of a dozen Boston cream doughnuts and a two liter of RC Cola, and the front of his jersey was always clean. During his career at Wooster, Coach once restarted his own heart. His only fear is lightning.

He's also an expert at rousing team morale. In my four years at Wooster, Coach has basically been the reason I get up and run every day. An example, as told by Wooster alum Eliot Fackler:

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  Eliot Fackler

  Coach to the men's team, mid September 2003:
  
  We’re doing some faster stuff on Thursday. We wanna beat Allegheny. I’ve heard about the Gators all season. I’m sick of hearing about the Allegheny Gators. I can’t even read this book, Zac the Alligator, to my daughters anymore. In this story, there’s this little kid who gets a toy alligator from his uncle in Florida. You’re supposed to water this alligator and it gets bigger. So, the kid puts it in the shower and the alligator gets bigger and bigger. Then the alligator comes to life, and he’s this really cocky alligator who sings and dances and says, ‘look at me, I’m Zac the alligator.’ And he causes all kinds of trouble and the little kid gets blamed. Finally Zac the alligator goes out in the sun and dries out. He starts shrinking because he needs water, and that’s exactly what those slaps at Allegheny are going to do when they get to the pond at the bottom of the golf course at the conference meet. [continued]

   ·  · May 19, 2008 at 11:01pm
  

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Eliot Fackler

They’re going to start shrinking and they’ll jump in the pond because they need water. We’re going to beat the Gators. That’s what we’ve been preparing to do all season and we’re going to do it. We haven’t won a conference title since 1989. We’re gonna do it this year. Then we’re going to come back two weeks later and challenge the top teams in the region to go to the national meet.
Now, it’s a great day to run! It’s cold and rainy... true Cross Country weather. You have to go out there, face adversity, challenge it, and overcome it. Let’s go!

Today we have the first meet of the season - home course, 6:00. It's a 4k. It's going to be 90º and 75% humidity. About which Coach said yesterday, "Well, we're going to go out conservative. We don't want to go out too fast tomorrow and be wiped out at the end. But we're going to run hard and be competitive. And when you put on that Wooster singlet, make sure you take pride in that. Because this is - without a doubt - the best cross country program in the country. And you all represent that program. It's going to be a beautiful day tomorrow - a nice warm day for a race."

So in the race today - even though it'll be blistering hot and I'm not in tip-top shape from my 8 months off of training - I'm going to go run as fast as I can at the moment, just because Coach told me to.

the coolest kid on campus

Monday - the first day of my senior year of college. I flounced across the dewy academic quad in my new dress, backpack stocked with new pens, waving excitedly at all my old college chums I hadn't seen since my semester in New Zealand. (Okay, that last sentence is a lie. I didn't actually see anybody I knew. Somehow 80% of the student body look like freshmen this year. But so do I, so that's not saying much.)

I hurried into the grand old stone castle of the humanities departments to be a fashionable 5 minutes early for my poetry class. I sat down on a bench next to a dumpy girl in sweatpants and glasses.

"Are you here for Spanish class?" she asked.

I glanced at her and shook my head. Why was she waiting outside of the classroom for modernist poetry? Weirdo. A student walked into the room and I jumped up to catch the door before it shut.

I sat down at a chair in the middle of the room and looked around. I knew a couple people there. My roommate Libby was supposed to be in this class, but she wasn't there yet. More kids filtered in. A couple political science majors. A girl who'd once thrown up on the cross-country team's couch. A kid in a flat-brimmed hat. The dumpy girl from the bench. Where were the ironic square-framed glasses? Where were the leather messenger bags? This was all wrong.

I opened my planner. The numbers didn't jive with the numbers on the door. As quietly as I could, I shut the planner and slid it into my bag. Then I snuck out the door and hurried upstairs into the loving arms of my fellow English students.

I never found out if it was a Spanish class or not.

Coming back to campus is a bit of a shock, mostly because everything has shifted about five feet from from where it used to be: the printers in the library, professor's offices, the dressing at the salad bar. There's an entirely new gym and fitness facility, so I never know exactly where the exercise machines are or how to use them correctly. The English faculty's gotten rid of a bunch of old people and brought in a bunch of new ones. And the library's been reorganized yet again to help people locate numbers in order on a shelf.

Sometimes I find myself wandering around lost trying to remember my mailbox combination, and then some nice person intervenes to ask me how I'm liking my first semester of college.

Very much, thanks.

Besides being a poorly-adjusted upperclassman, I'm also kind of busy. I've got a senior project to work on (details pending), cross country practice every day, a whole bunch of photography supplies to buy, and a digestive system that's still adjusting to the cafeteria food.

Luckily, I found this blog to distract me.

I love this ice-cream-headed man so much I might set him as my desktop background. Or marry him, because what says romance better than an edible face?

Also coming soon - a compendium of Coach Rice quotes and pictures of tie-dye shirts.

Preview: "You all look like you've got tar on your shoes right now. But by the end of the season, you'll be so fast you won't believe it. You know what? I'm going to dip all your shoes in tar and see if it comes off at the end of the season. Right in time for the Conference Championship. Heh, heh."