I really knew I wanted to take advantage of all the school sports available at American high schools for my exchange year in the US plus I have a little bucket list for the year and one item to accomplish was 'win something' so I had hoped doing a sport would help me achieve that. One of the sports available in the 2nd school semester was track and field. I had done running in PE classes when I was younger and had never come last in the sprints(nor had I come first or second either...) so I thought it would be something I could have a go at plus it seemed such a 'cool' sport as you get to hang out with both guys and girls, go to big track meets and it is frequently mentioned in movies. Plus it's not really a team sport and I am not a fan of team sports for fear of letting others down. I don't think I realised that instead of having to worry about letting others down, in track and field you just have to worry about embarrassment whilst everyone stares at you when you come in last or 'scratch' at the long jump. Unfortunately, since I'm not the fittest person in the world I got injured very quickly during the season. First it was my left foot. Then I had shin splints. And lastly I injured my back during spring break(on a trampoline!) and probably made the injury worse by going to a themepark the next day and riding on the rollercoasters. So this whole season I have only ran 2 races and participated in the long jump for a record....2 times at the meets! I didn't even bother going to the last meet as I knew I wouldn't have been able to run at all with both my back and shins hurting and I watched as the track team walked past my class to go on the yellow school bus to their meet. It was really sad. I'd hoped that I would actually improve by the end of this season but I've always been last and now in two days in the final meet of the season and I don't even know if they'll let me run in it anyway since I've missed so many meets. I really wish I would have gone to an American highschool all through my teen years then I would have had the opportunity to start track in my freshman year or even in junior high and would really have improved. I'm still ever so greatful for the experience and participating in track allowed me to meet some really great people that I'm closer to than almost anyone else at school. I was thinking about perhaps doing track at an american college as part of another study abroad program but I'm assuming by that stage the students would be really elite but I can always do running and weight training in the mean time and build up my fitnest level. At the moment I'm trying to decide what sport I should do for the next season in the new school year which I've realised will only be about four months(time is flying....). I'd really like to do cheerleading but that's a whole other kettle of fish....
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