What is the strangest and/or stupidest thing you've ever done on a run with your team?

Our team had a problem with taking things that weren't bolted down, and a few that were. Over the years we collected ESPN banners from Footlocker, signs from Metroparks, and maybe one of the best, a full-sized light post (how we got that home on the bus, well our coaches weren't that bright).

Anyhow, one run we are out and a work crew is on a relatively non-busy road - doing some sort of work. It's getting late in the day, and you can tell they're mostly finishing up. Down the road, we see one of the men at work mesh signs just sitting there, attached to a metal frame and barrel. A few of us stop and attempt to remove it. While this is occurring, the workers start heading toward us (they can't see us, but we panic still. One of our runners, is holding onto the sign, but on the ground attempting to take it off the barrel. Well, two other runners panic, grab the sign and frame and take off, dragging the other runner, who is now holding on tight. They made it about 100 meters before he fell off. We all took off into the woods, with the sign, which one of us has to this day.

The other nominee was related to the team exhibition problems. Many guys on the team ran with their shorts down. Shirts were long enough to hide things. That is until you'd raise your arms up. Raising your arms up as your ran by the softball fields. Softball fields with women athletes. Softball fields by the road where school busses occasionally drive by. And the coach's ex-wife happens to drive a school bus. This leads to one of your athletes falling on the sword for everyone and missing a few meets.

well when I was in high school, there was this train bridge high over a river that we were pretty sure was abandoned. so, seeing as we had exhausted most of the normal running routes around our school, we thought it'd be a good idea to run across the bridge (with wooden slats and breaks in between them every foot or two). also, keep in mind that there is absolutely no room to get off if a train is coming, because most people wouldn't be dumb enough to go across a train bridge above a river. it takes a really long time to walk/jog across this bridge that's like a mile long, and we hear train whistles, which is NOT a good thing. couple days later, we saw a train going over that bridge. needless to say, we never went across that river bridge again :p

ronner wrote:

Some poor HS coaches are reading this thread and deciding they are never going to let their teams run without supervision again!

Actually I think its good for team bonding. We had awesome teams and have had them for a long time. Here are some things we do.

We go out for 1hr run and come back 2-3 hours later bruised, full of welts, and scratches. 10-15 years ago some runners found a big field of cattails. So they all run to the field, divide into teams and have a cattail battle. The tradition has been passed down through various generations of runners. The guys wear it like a badge of honor.

or

We run off to some woods about 1-2mi square and play man hunt

or

My all time favorite was a piece of a creek that ran off into a small swimming hole. During the summer/fall the guys would run to the hole and swim and relax. During the winter when the water would freeze they would play hockey or ice skate or whatever.

When I went off to school I realized some teams never did stupid stuff or just ran to the creek on a hot day and would lay down in the water. Their high school programs sounded to uptight.

My high school track team was a joke, the distance guys got coached like sprinters and pretty much nobody ever reached their potential. As a result, almost everyone except our team's future D1 recruit didn't care anymore. Once a season, we had a workout where we would do a 5K on the road three times and we were supposed to run each one faster than the last.

Everyone always did the first one really slowly (like conversational pace) and as a pack, and midway through, one senior said that he was going to cut the course for the next two repeats.

That senior did around 18 minutes for the second one, which didn't surprise the coach too much, but on his third attempt he broke 14.

Back in high school the mid-d guys (4 of us) would take this 7 mile regular run and we always passed this old train bridge across the river. One day, on a shorter easy day we decided to go out and back for a total of 4 miles, but instead we thought to do a 4 mile loop by going across these train tracks. If you want a picture, think of the scene in Stand by Me. I hesitantly went as I was afraid of heights and had $*%t to do, but I'm a weakling for peer pressure. I just remember crossing this long as bridge scared as hell and just wanted to crawl across. They were walking and jumping across. After we crossed we found out it was not a short cut and had to add another mile. Later that season we also discovered trains still rode those tracks.

We used to run on high speed train tracks all the time. I'm not sure why we did it, since running on train tracks is pretty uncomfortable. Typically, it was the guy in the back's job to check behind him periodically to make sure no trains were coming, but one time he forgot and a train came up on us. It actually stopped, and the conductor came out to try to chase us down, but we had already jumped the fence and run away.

Choo Choo wrote:

We used to run on high speed train tracks all the time. I'm not sure why we did it, since running on train tracks is pretty uncomfortable. Typically, it was the guy in the back's job to check behind him periodically to make sure no trains were coming, but one time he forgot and a train came up on us. It actually stopped, and the conductor came out to try to chase us down, but we had already jumped the fence and run away.

WTF?

#1 How did you not hear a train coming up behind you?

#2 How did it stop in time to not hit you?

The high school team was rather fond of “high speed hyjynx”. Being from a rural area allowed probably for more mischief than usual. Continuing with the railroad motif, we used to “light up the tracks” with wire coat hangers, so that the barriers would come down and block the only crossing in town. We could watch the traffic back up for tens of minutes before it got old.

The day we got a new and very naive assistant coach, we took her across the train trestle as well, and it is quite the scary experience. The bridge spans probably 100 metres with a 25 metre drop to the river below. There were no trains that time, but there was one close encounter. It’s really not the smartest thing to do, because it is a serious offense to trespass on what is considered private property.

We also had a complete hick on the team who ran straight into traffic while crossing Main Street for no reason, screaming only “I’m from the cunntree, I don’t know what to do!” This was the same kid who also yelled “Look at the a*s on that bi*ch!” while we passed a middle-aged lady walking her dog. He then said he just really liked labs. And also the same kid who would pick up roadkill and swing them by the tail into stop signs.

There are certainly more stories.

The train was coming around a bend, and it was an electric train that's not very loud, so you wouldn't really hear it. Plus, "high speed" kind of varies - I'd guess the train was going about 45 mph where we were. Someone in front of the last guy happened to look around and see it was coming, so we weren't all THAT close to getting hit, but a few seconds later and someone might've gotten hurt.

I also remember that sometimes we had to jump over the third rail when we needed to get off the tracks. There was usually a cover on top, though.

Anyway, yeah, don't run on train tracks.

me and my mates at uni were on the sunday long run. was after a heavy night celebrating from a successful race that day. anyway, we decided to head for the hills, meaning we had to run right through the middle of town to get there. unfortunately, there just so happened to be an EDL (English Defence League- look it up, there a bunch of w***ers) march going on that day, so we didnt exactly feel comfortable running through the high street. however, there was a wilkinson shop (british supermarket) that took you from the high steet from the front of the shop to the back of town at its back entrance. so, we thought f*ck it, we'll just run through wilkinsons and get out of town that way! so, as i mentioned before we had been out and many of us were still a little bit drunk, and thus in high spirits. we got half way into wilko's before a few guys stopped at the pick and mix (not sure if u have these in the US, basically this is the candy section). we turned round and they were jogging back to us with piles of candy in their hands shouting "lads, anybody want some sugared mice!" what they hadnt realised was that the security guard was literally 10m away and had seen anything. well, you can guess what happened next, he ran after them, so they ran off too, candy flying everywhere. we also bolted, the result being a load of scantily clad drunken runners sprinting through a supermarket with some poor guy shouting for them to stop, to the bemusement of the other customers! we all went in different directions (i actually ended up in the womens lingerie section so looked like a right pervert in my vest and shorts!!1), so it took quite a long time for us all to meet up again 200m away from the back entrance, but we all got away, and even had some sugared mice and jelly snakes to share for the rest of the run!!!

a few of us were running up a hill and some strange woman was sitting on the sidewalk demanding that we offer her some bologna. only two of us had bologna, but we refused to share. she chased us for two miles and nearly got our bologna but we got away just in time

'Murica!. No clue what you are trying to get at with that, bro.

In 7th grade I was running alone because it was before track season, and I was the only kid who trained off season. I was running a few feet away from the road on the left side. There were no sidewalks. A car came around the corner, and I didn't think anything of it until the car veered off the road, and headed right for me, albeit the car slowed down considerably. As it got very close, I saw that the driver inside had a smirk on his face and was making eye contact with me. If I remember him correctly, he looked like Dwight Shrute from the office. I'm not sure why he wanted to run a kid off the road, maybe I reminded him of his bullies 20 years prior. He kept up with this game of chicken and got very close- he going about 10 mph and I going about 7:30 minute/miles. I sped up, took a leap of faith, jump on his hood, and continued in stride. When I stepped on the roof of his car, I felt it cave-in under my weight. Knowing the shit had just hit the fan, I jumped from the roof, over the trunk, and onto the ground.

Who knows what his reaction was, because I high-tailed it to a nearby trail.

everyone just read that in a british accent in their head.