How a pinstripe changed cross-country history

This story just posted to the New York Times Web site, and [this just in] appeared in the newspaper December 13.

I got interested in this after reading in the Baltimore Sun about a weird ending to a high school cross-country meet here in Maryland. The runner who'd finished fourth (out of 120 in the meet) was disqualified 15 minutes or so after the race. In turn, his team, which had been the apparent winner, dropped to third place.

The trangression of the runner, a nice young man named John Riemer? The compression shorts he had worn under his running pants were adorned with a thin white pinstripe. (Click on the image for a better view of the nonconforming shorts. John is wearing number 23). That violated a new and somewhat obscure high school rule that prohibits undershorts with "contrasting" stitching. I spent a morning at Hereford High School interviewing John and the Hereford cross-country coach, Jason Bowman.

It turns out that wardrobe malfunctions of this type crop up a few times each year.

A high school runner's lament

I've never met Gabriel Weiss, but I'm already mightily impressed by him. Gabriel is a junior at a Jesuit high school near Dallas. He is a cross country and track athlete. And he is a thoughtful young man who, on the subject of kids and sports, expresses himself well. Last week, Gabriel wrote a piece for the Dallas Morning News about why he continues to play competitive sports. This paragraph stopped me.

"The games have been played the same since my grandfather's era, but a different mentality has taken over. The motivation beneath the helmets of football players and other competitive athletes is heavily influenced by scholarships and intense pressure from coaches and parents. The emphasis put on lengthy practices, which begin long before the season, transforms many high school sports into an almost full-time job. Can this high-stakes, pressure-infused way of playing possibly enhance the game, or is this tainting the true meaning of sports?"

The adults (myself included) may think we've disguised our ambitions and expectations for our kids in competitive sports. As Gabriel points out so well, most of us haven't.

Thanks to Doug Abrams for pointing out Gabriel's commentary.