Hi, this is Debbie Boyles, coach at Mojo for Running with podcast number five.

Today, I have the story of three teen cross-country runners.

As an ex-teacher, these and all school-age kids are close to my heart.

This age group, particularly because most of my teaching was in high schools.

This is actually an article I wrote for Florida Running and Triathlon Magazine.

I write an article for each issue,

and the article always features several runners embarking on some new running adventure.

This article is titled,

Three Teens Discover the Challenge and Excitement of-country running. A look at the teen

years of the most accomplished leaders reveals a common threat, involvement in team sports

in school. Ask any of them, and they will tell you the experience was invaluable. They'll tell you

they learned to work hard, really hard,

and to see the big picture. Not what was necessarily best for them as an individual, but what

was best for the team. In some cases, they tasted leadership for the first time, but equally

important, they learned how to be a team player. That is reason enough to play team sports,

but I didn't even mention fitness. And while all sports are worthwhile, I would say the ones that

promise the greatest impact on lifelong fitness are the ones that easily carry over into

adulthood. Because road races are accessible to virtually everyone, everywhere, getting started

in either of those endeavors as a youth virtually guarantees fitness for life because few

runners will ever stop running. That means participation in school cross-country teams has an

immeasurable impact on life.

And I don't think that's an overstatement.

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