Day one complete

Made it to the hotel around 8 eastern time, which may have been a little ahead of schedule. Not entirely certain. Possibly.

We had dinner at Montana Mike’s which is comparable to a Texas Roadhouse/Logan’s/O’Charley’s hybrid. A little bit of everything.

I was told to blog about a specific event: Dylan (and I think Zack, too) got the monstrous burger that was on the menu. Two half-pound patties (and the usual toppings). The standard is just one of those patties, and even those looked quite large… Apparently it was a challenge of sorts to finish all the food they were given, at least in Dylan’s case, fries and all.

(Excuse the not-the-greatest-of-pictures. He was talking at the time.)

The rest of the evening was uneventful. A few people went swimming for a bit, and others just relaxed in their rooms. Pretty ok for an end of a long day.

Tomorrow’s itinerary includes shopping downtown and practice at the course. Should be grand.

Still Rollin’

We stopped for our run at the Chain of Rocks Bridge along old Route 66. The bridge is now pedestrian only and has little relics from when the bridge was used for car traffic: an old gas pump, some signs and an old car. On either side of the Mississippi, there’s a paved path that goes farther than any if us had to run today, but it was a nice change of scenery.

When everyone was done, we took a group photo and headed to lunch. In the St. Louis area, Panera Bread is called the St. Louis Bread Company. Exactly the same thing, so if you’re ever there and curious, that’s what it is.

There’s about 4-4 1/2 hours between St. Louis and Lawrence. Since we stopped so late for lunch, dinner will be in Lawrence. Slight adjustment to the original itinerary, but no complaints here.

So far, we’ve gone through The Way Way Back, Pacific Rim, The Internship and we just started watching The Hunger Games. The plan is to see the second movie as a group on this trip. I kind of wanted to read the book before I saw the movies, but I’m kind of late for that, at this point.

2 1/2-3 hours to go.

By the bridge after our run outside St. Louis
Photo courtesy of Becca’s Instagram 🙂

On our way

7am. Wednesday, Nov. 20. 14 Tech cross country runners board the bus bound for Lawrence, Kansas. First couple hours are spent, by most, catching up on sleep that eluded them the night before.

There are no shortage of movies for the bus ride. For a 12 hour trip, it’s necessary. Coach redboxed a few, and a few people brought DVDs by the handful. We’ve learned from experience that it’s better to have too many, than too few or, even worse, none at all. Some brought other things to do, others have just slept or listened to music, zoning out for the trip so far. It’s been pretty uneventful, which is fine.

Currently, we are outside Terre Haute. Pretty close to the Illinois border. Pretty smooth sailing so far. Only hit one patch of construction traffic and that was only a few minutes ago.

The current plan is to stop for lunch (soon, I hope) and get going in time to get to the Mississippi River pathway in St. Louis around 1:30 for a run. The ETA for the hotel is around 8pm central, so we still have quite the journey ahead…

I’ll have more opportunities to post more and put up some pictures once we get to the hotel and get situated…and once I actually get some pictures of us not on the bus.

For those who are curious, we are currently watching Pacific Rim.

Introduction

To give some background, I am Aubree Reichel. I am currently a graduate student in my third year of cross country and track at Indiana Tech. I originally played soccer, but made the switch after my junior year season. I graduated in May with a degree in Communications and I work at the Journal Gazette newspaper in Fort Wayne and in the Tech athletic department. This blog was set up and is intended to be a glimpse into athletes’ trips to national championship competitions, and this is the first opportunity that we have to utilize it.

The NAIA cross country national championships is scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 23 at Rim Rock Farm in Lawrence, Kansas.

Indiana Tech Warriors Athletics

This blog will be home to various Indiana Tech student-athletes who will give fans an inside look into life as an athlete at Tech and their championship events.