A Little Tale Involving Coach Groves. Tangentially. A Lesson Well Learned.

It was the Spring of 1980. A wonderful time in America.  The Iranian crisis was just beginning, but the Gas crisis was over.  College students were overwhelmingly opting to support albino third party candidate John Anderson over B-actor Ronald Reagan and peanut farmer Jimmy Carter. Dorms routinely blared the vinyl hit "Paradise by the Dashboard Lights" by Meat Loaf and Chicken Cosmos were served for lunch at the dining Halls.

In those days, us distance runners ran 100 miles a week or more, even if you didn't satisfy Coach Groves mandate of morning miles before 9:00AM.  We finally had a real Conference Meet, a slapped together mish mash of teams in Joe Paterno's attempt of an Eastern Big Ten.

It was held in Piscattaway, NJ, home of Rutgers University.  No one would ever have predicted that both Rutgers and Penn State would one day end up as opponents in every sport IN THE BIG TEN!

The Coaches Conference (I guess named for JOE P?) included Rutgers, Temple, Syracuse, West Virginia and others...  (help me out, Interns?).  This group of colleges eventually became the Big East, minus Penn State who had to join the Atlantic Ten.

But today, May 25, 1980, was the big day for me, PSU Track Alumni Official Physicist Brian Boyer, 2-time Coach Groves Golf Tourney winner Don Ziter and Noisy Jim Clelland in the opening event on Sunday, the 10,000M.

The day started with Coach Groves summoning us to a very early breakfast prior to the late morning race.  It was only the first time I was berated by Coach Groves that day, as I had a full breakfast of bacon, eggs and home fries while the others ate lightly of carbs and yogurt, like hippies.

Things turned a little for the better for me as I was somehow allowed to ride shot gun with Coach Groves driving the van with only the 10K runners heading over to the track for the first event.  This gave me a unique insight into the complicated mind of Coach Groves as the traffic enveloped us.  Everyone knows how bad Route 1 traffic is in Central NJ.  Usually there is the right turn lane that leads to "All turns from right lane".  But at this intersection, there was a left turn lane with a traffic light.

On this particular morning there was almost no traffic on the road except for those of us trying to turn left off of Route 1.  Imagine 40 cars in line with a red light with no traffic anywhere else.  Now imagine the light finally turning green and letting 2 cars through at a time before another 2 or 3 minute cycle of nothing.  Now imagine Coach Groves' patience and understanding of such situations!
Imagine his disdain for those ahead of him, who hesitated even after the green light finally came!

He taught me the first life lesson that day while telling me how 6 could get through the light if everyone just started ahead when the light turned green instead of each successive car hesitating after each of those ahead of it pulled forward. This little maneuver has probably saved me hours and hours of time in traffic over the years.  And almost caused 30 accidents, too!

I was in a phase at that time where I was experimenting with no warm-up prior to a race. (As well as no stretching. I was ahead of my time!)  So I avoided the others when they headed out.  No stretching and no warm-up was not in Coach's wheel-house, so I had to avoid him as well.

With the temperature in the mid-90s already, warming up really was unnecessary except to raise the heart rate with a single slow lap of the track before the gun.  At the start line we were told that the NCAA had given us permission to be hosed down during the race. I never availed myself of that.

The race was off, and somehow the heat didn't cause me any distress, while I noticed others were bothered quite early.  I ran with the lead pack for the first time in my life in a track 10K, trying to click off even laps as I had done the week before in State College when I ran my PR.

Halfway through the race, I noticed that Coach Groves was actually acknowledging me on each lap.  The lead pack had dwindled a lot and I never saw any of my teammates during the race.  I was still with the leaders with 2 laps to go, when the 2 guys from another team surged, and I hesitated and didn't go with them.  I hung on somewhat and had a little left and actually finished 3rd in a Conference Meet.  I thus scored 6 points for PSU, the first of my PSU "career".  I never saw my teammates during the race, but saw Jim Clelland finish not far behind me.  Don and Brian had pretty good races too, if I remember correctly.

I was tickled about my finish.  Not totally satisfied, as I knew that if I still had my high school competitiveness, I could have won the race.  But it was still my best finish in a PSU track race, I scored points for the team, and I had beaten at least one All-American that day.

So, of course, Coach Groves was there to straighten me out and put my world into sharp focus.  He came by me during my recovery jog and called me a part of the female anatomy that is below the waist. He too knew I could have won the race.

He was correct, of course.  Sometimes, life lessons are tough.  And Coach was never hesitant to render such life lessons.  I have thanked him many times for that since.  He may be the only man who has never lied to me.  And I have achieved some difficult things in life remembering that there is always more to give and a chance not taken is a chance that is lost.