Introduction

At a small-town Wisconsin High School in the fall of 1979, a small bit of magic happened (combined with a lot of hard work). This blog aims to tell the story, from the inside, of a ragtag bunch of teenage boys who managed to shape themselves into a pretty tough cross country team, and to out-perform everyone's expectations (except perhaps their own). We'll look back at that cross country campaign day-by-day, reviewing the workouts, race results, characters, and context of that season. Maybe we'll gain a few insights along the way, but at the very least we can see how a high school team trained and raced 30 years ago, and if much has really changed since then.

History
Baraboo High School had been a sort of local running powerhouse during the 1960s and 1970s, with a successful cross country squad year-after-year, guided by coach Harry Haslanger. By the late 70s, however, Haslanger's doctor had ordered him to stop coaching due to health concerns, and the team had lost a bit of its impetus without his experienced leadership. The previous year (1978), the team had come together somewhat, but was hit hard by injuries and illnesses, and had finished the season with disappointing (and nearly last-place) performances at both the conference championship meet and the regional qualifiers.

1979: Setting the stage
Immediately following the 1978 season, some of the runners (see "Cast of Characters" to the right) got together to set higher goals for the next year. Two things seemed necessary: recruiting as many of the school's best runners onto the team as possible, and sticking together as a unit (the 1978 team had been undermined by intra-team divisions and rivalries, which had turned the workouts into races and wore everyone down). Adding to the momentum, the BHS track and field team in the spring of 1979 capped off a rather inconsistent season by truly coming together as a team at the Conference Championship meet, and surprising the heavily-favored teams from Portage and Wisconsin Dells by leaping/running/throwing past them and taking first place (the victory being in doubt until the final event had ended). At that meet, the distance runners had performed quite well, coming away with renewed confidence and sense of pride. All of these factors helped to motivate a number of the runners to train a bit more seriously through the summer of 1979, even organizing a weekly run together (which was sparsely-attended, but still provided a touchstone for team unity).

A life cut short
Most interesting stories also contain elements of tragedy, and this one is no exception. Perhaps there is nothing more sad than the death of someone who is young and for whom life has only just begun to unfold. As teenagers, we are all prone to the illusion that life is long and permanent, that danger and risk are just things that our mothers worry about. We think we are invulnerable, and we don't realize how short and precious life truly is. At the very beginning of summer 1979, the close-knit group of BHS distance runners was shocked to its core when the news of the death of one of our teammates reverberated through the community. A one-car accident had taken the life of Charlie Nelson, just like that. Charlie had been a unifying figure on the 1978 team, cracking jokes and befriending everyone. He was a free spirit, the kind of runner who would toss off his shoes and run intervals barefoot on freshly-mown grass "just to feel the tickle" ... the kind of teammate who, on a rainy day, dripped a little shampoo in your shoes when you weren't looking, so that your entire run would be spent leaving a trail of soap suds in the road. We loved Charlie, and he loved running in the kind of playful way that too many of us forget to embrace. Now he was gone. After the funeral, we decided to dedicate our upcoming 1979 season to the memory and honor of Charlie.

This blog
I plan to post items each day, or at least each day upon which I have a written entry in my running log, which I started keeping in May of 1978 and still keep to this day, over 55,000 running miles later. I also have old press clippings and photos stashed away in a scrapbook, yellowed with age but still able to evoke powerful memories (at least for me). I hope that the postings will be augmented with your comments (if you are reading any post, check to see if there are any comments before moving to the next). In addition, if you have other perspectives or memories of that season, please send them to me via email and I'll try to incorporate them into the postings. I anticipate that the typical posting will consist of the training log details of that day, or race details when appropriate, followed by commentary from the vantage point of 30 years later. I will try to scan some old photos and clippings and get them in here too.

Limits and apologies: Because I only have comprehensive records for the 1979 BHS CC boy's team, I simply can't write much about the girl's team. I'll mention them here and there, and when it comes to the races, but the details of their story must be found elsewhere.

I hope you find this chronicle enjoyable and interesting. And if it inspires just one of you to get out the door and run, then it's worth every minute of time I put into it.

Douglas Hegley
BHS class of 1980
1979 South Central Conference Individual Cross Country Champion

PS: If you are coming across this log after it started, try reading the posts in reverse (that is, in chronological order, starting with the oldest and working up from the bottom, rather than from top down). That should make the story flow a little better. Hint: beginning with this post, scroll all the way to the bottom and click the "Newer Post" link. If you do that on each subsequent page, you will work your way along in chronological order.