Why We Cheer From The Sidelines

We cheer for you. And we cheer for us.

Nov 02, 2024

I came up with a list of 15 messages and we made them into signs to give our to fans that lined the hill at the SF Nike Women’s Series back in 2015.

Back in 2015 I was asked how the pacers and coaches of the Nike Run Club could best be used at the Nike Women’s Race race in San Francisco. Leading group stretches beforehand? Someone had that idea. I said, “nah”. How about handing out the swag bags after the finish line? “That’s gonna be a no, too.” How about cheering on the last straightaway. “We shouldn’t be there either” I said.

I asked for a course map. I pointed to a specific stretch. There. That’s where we’ll be. We’ll be right there. What’s there? That’s the big ass hill that everyone is going to be terrified of. That’s the bottom of that long and scary stretch that leads to the top. We’ll meet everyone at the bottom. And we’re going to run with them. And we’ll have people cheering the whole way. We’ll drive fans and supporters and pacers and coaches there to that hill. We’ll make signs that mean something and we’ll hand them out. We’ll give everyone on the sideline some noisemakers. We’re going to make that stretch of uphill running the most beautiful and badass part for the race because it’s the hardest part. The race doesn’t end at the top. But that’s going to be where we tell those runners just how amazing they are. We’ll crest the apex with them and then we are going to run to the bottom and run someone else back up. That’s how we can best be used.

This is a great shot of the last stretch of “the hill”.

I was thinking about this today. Why? Well, a whole bunch of reasons. The NYC Marathon is this weekend. There are dozens of NCAA conference XC championships taking place. High schoolers are ramping up their seasons and taking the line at their own cross country state championships. And at every one of these races there are fans lining the courses. Fans, family members, teammates, and strangers are clapping and yelling and supporting the runners as they try their best to be their best. It’s almost impossibly beautiful. I’m talking about the sidelines. Yes, the runners are beautiful too. But you already knew that. Heck, I talk about just how beautiful runners and running is almost every newsletter. But today I want to talk about the humans that take the sidelines and not the humans crossing those starting lines.

And I want to say thank you to everyone on the other side of the rope or standing on the sidewalks. Thank you to the people in the stands and out there on the trails encouraging those runners. You don’t need to be there. You don’t need to clap for all those people. You don’t need to tell that stranger that they’re crushing it. You don’t need to high five that dude running by. You don’t need to tell that young athlete that she is a rock star. But you do. Why? I’ve got my suspicions.

The goal was to make the hardest part of the race be the most meaningful, supported, joyous and powerful part of the race too.

You see people letting themselves be vulnerable out there. Think about it. Every race demands that you allow the possibility of failure into your life… potentially a very public failure. That takes an incredible amount of courage to be that vulnerable. That’s a courage that inspires. Inspires people like you and me to scream and clap and cheer. And you see heroic efforts out there on the streets and trails. You see breakthroughs. You see comebacks. You see barriers being broken. You see people achieving their goal. You see runners coming up short. You see strangers struggling and persevering. You see hope and faith and endurance out there too. And that gives you hope and renews your faith and reminds you that you too have what it takes to endure. And you are grateful for those reminders. So you cheer.

The messages worked because they were honest.

So, back in 2015 we lined that hill in San Francisco. And we cheered. And we ran up and we ran down and we ran up again and we ran down again and we kept running up and down until we ran everyone up that hill. We cheered. We waved all those signs that said what we were thinking so those runners could know just how epic we thought they were for what they were doing.

All of us coaches and pacers… we never made it to the finish line. That’s not where we were needed. And the finish line didn’t have what we needed either. It was all on that hill. That’s where we could help the runners most and where the runners could remind us why we cheer. We cheer because they remind us who we can be when we try to be our best whether that’s on the other side of the starting line or on the sideline. And that version of us… running or helping runners… well that version of us is worth cheering for.

Cheers,

Coach Bennett

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