Running With the Night

I text my friend Sargento last night to update him on the Wolfpack’s dominance over Florida State (Hey Huck – how did the Heel’s do against FSU? Mack Brown still O for life at last check). You see Sargento was doing HIM work as a volunteer for his church’s youth group weekend at Bonclarken in the mountains. So I kept him updated at all the good things the Pack was doing enroute to a 38-22 victory. Since the Big Cheese was unable to participate in Saturday morning’s PT test, he asked if I would proctor for him, you know to make it legit, because NC State grads don’t take fake classes – you earn the grade and the diploma. Man – that’s a few pot shots at the boys in blue – yeah I know, you won a few weeks ago after our QB broke his leg. Let’s move on to the main event.

“It’s a test of ultimate will, the heartbreak climb uphill. Got to pick up the pace, if you want to stay in the race. More than just blind ambition, more than just simple greed, more than just a finish line, must feed this burning need.” Now some of you are thinking, wow, I knew Short Sale could write a backblast, but that intro is shear poetry. It sure is – ‘hey Whoopee, you like that? Guess who wrote it? Not George Strait – that’s for damn sure. So I riffed a few lines from Neil Peart’s Marathon lyrics. But something like that was driving Sargento to better his initial PT from this summer. So I roll up to the Cramerton MS track and find our boy stretching. He has his bluetooth speaker which scares me a little because the Venn diagram our our two musical tastes has little overlap. So I remind Sargento of the rules and particularly the order, which Broke emphasized several times Saturday morning. Without much fanfare, Sargento takes off for lap one. Upon his return, I join him in the merkin portion as he reminded me of his soccer arm syndrome. I shared that segment was tough for all to accomplish, even the bat flippers took a break or two along the way. He progressed nicely through the next sets and into lap 2. Now mind you I didn’t have my measuring wheel to ensure the Cramerton track was 400m or at minimum, the same distance as Grier’s track – let’s assume they are. Sargento’s quarter splits were strong at 1:48 on average for the eight laps he ran.

I mentioned the bluetooth speaker – I only had to fastforward through one song in the playlist. The most odd song was Lionel Ritchie’s Running With the Night, which is my selected title of this event. Fun fact – did you know the full 6 minute version of the song ends with a more than two minute guitar solo which was performed by Steve Lukather of Toto, so this song has a little bit of rock credibility, kind of like Eddie Van Halen playing on Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” I’m not aware of any straight men or rock stars accompanying Tears for Fears, so Sargento has yet to win me over on that batch of ‘music.’

So after all the reps and laps were done, Sargento clocked in at 32:08.20, more than six minutes of improvement from his earlier time. Just think if he were to start doing merkins daily – he’d be in Broke territory, well maybe. Anyway, I’m glad I got to witness the feat of accomplishment. If for anything else, it was a chance to write a BB. But as many of us feel, when an F3 brother asks for help, we’re happy to oblige. Maybe I’ll get an invite to that Fake Ruck Club now?