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Why I Love Cross Country By Shaan Khan

Photo courtesy of Ahnika Mangalick

To the average person, running might not seem like an ideal way to spend their time. Running every day for sport probably sounds even less fun. However, running on the cross country team throughout high school was lots of fun for me. Whether it was seeing steady improvement, bonding with my teammates, or just suffering through a bad run with one of my friends, running on the team became enjoyable.

The first thing that makes cross country enjoyable is how I feel after. Although the runs can be hard and they can hurt, at the end of every run I feel energized and amazing. On top of that, the progress seen after running for a while is rewarding and motivating.

The next reason I enjoy cross country is because of my teammates. While running with my teammates, we bond over how difficult the runs could be and it makes these difficult runs much more enjoyable. On bad days we suffered through it together, and on good days we sped up. Although cross country may seem like a solo sport where runners run alone, it really is a team sport, as the whole team strives to compete together. At the meets where we are supposed to challenge ourselves to run as fast as we can, we all end up pushing each other to be the best runners that we can be. I know that without my teammates, cross country would be a lot more difficult and I would have run a lot slower.

Lastly, cross country was fun because of the meets. At the practices we ran fast but didn’t try to over do it in order to steadily get faster. At the meets, however, we went as a group and participated in the races where we tried to keep up the fastest speeds we could for miles. After the races we always brought snacks like Oreos and Gatorade as we cheered on our teammates.

Although cross country can be difficult, and may not seem like an enticing pastime, bonding and competing with the team make it really fulfilling. I would recommend that if you’re not playing a sport during the fall, think about trying out cross country.