Track and Field Blogs - Scott Bauhs

Throughout my life I have never been as cold as I was at the USATF Club Cross-Country Championships this weekend. Slippery Rock was warm and toasty compared to Spokane. When I was racing I couldn't believe that I was actually subjecting myself to this pain. What was I being punished for and why was my punishment so cruel and unusual?

That said, the race went well. My legs felt great from the start but quickly into the race I realized that I made the rookie mistake of not tying my shoes tight enough. I stopped to try to fix the situation but my hands were way too cold to function so I decided to just risk it and hope that my shoe wouldn't be coming off.

Luckily by the grace of God I ended up stepping on the laces and my half inch spikes held them in place. My shoe was loose but it was still tight enough to stay on because of the spikes. It was annoying running with my shoe slipping around so much but I did my best to forget about it and forge on ahead.

I won by outkicking Andrew Carlson to complete a perfect season of racing with wins at Stanford, Willamette, CCAA Champs, West Regional’s, NCAA DII Champs, Synaptics Turkey Trot and Club XC. I am having a lot of fun running right now and part of me doesn't want to stop. However, I know I have really big fish to fry this track season and there is no way I could last if I didn't take a break.

I won’t be running for a while and when I start up running again I am going to take it slow. The rest of December will be a great chance for me to relax and enjoy the holidays without worrying about workouts or mileage. I will start building up through January and I will be moving to Mammoth towards the end of January and I will start getting serious again.