When I channel my inner sporty spice, the outcome is quite mediocre. My high school track coach called me, “the least dedicated person,” on the entire track team. While I understand he meant that as an insult, it was actually quite flattering to me because I’d never been #1 in anything sporty before.
In fact, I had never even been on varsity until the year I was named LDP—Least Dedicated Player. That was the year I walked on my high school track team, and made the varsity jumps team. But in no way does this count as a brag. You see, the majority of the former jumpers had either graduated or had desperately wanted out of jumps.
Let me put it this way.
If a person were in a country with a very questionable water source, but the only available bottled water was Dasani…Would that make Dasani his favorite water? Absolutely not, it still wouldn’t even make his top 100. Does Dasani’s “I won’t make you poop your pants,” factor increase its appeal? Slightly. The man begins to think, “Would instant diarrhea really be so bad?” He goes back and forth, to drink Dasani or to not drink Dasani…or in simpler terms: to poop yourself or to not poop yourself, that is the question. He ends up tossing a coin, Dasani wins! The crowd goes silent!
I imagine the decision to let me be on varsity was similar to that scenario, only less focus on bowel movements. My coach was probably thinking, “Would I rather Jess compete? Or be a jumper short, and have the jumps team be disqualified this season? Hmm…decisions, decisions. What to do, what to do…”
So really, I have exactly zero rights for bragging. I, a mere Dasani athlete, was on varsity purely out of desperation, not strategy. Had there been other student athletes with more of an “Evian,” “Smart Water,” or even “Kirkland Signature” pizzazz to them, my coach wouldn’t have even considered me. But unfortunately for him and my school, I was the only choice they had.
I accepted the offer, and thus my mediocre varsity career was born. I was assigned to High Jump and Long Jump, two of the three jumps. I wasn’t great at either, whenever I did High Jump, I resembled a whale breaching—except much less majestic looking.
However, it wasn’t until we started competing, that I began to realize how below average of a jumper I really was. The students from other schools were like NASA rockets, specifically designed to defy the laws of gravity. They would soar, while I would be sore from hitting the pole nearly every time. Pot-A-to, pot-AH-to.
I didn’t fully understand the technique behind the Long Jump, but the idea’s straightforward enough—run and jump. If you’ve ever played The Floor is Lava and had to jump from rug to rug, you’re (basically) a Long Jumper… Congrats!
At best, I was mediocre at High Jump and Long Jump, but was absolutely terrible at Triple Jump. However, no one knew this, myself included, until my coach needed someone to sub in for Triple Jump. One of the varsity girls was sick the day of the meet, so guess which very available athlete my coach asked to take her place? That’s right, me…the Dasani one.
Since I had never done the very jump that Satan himself had concocted, someone was teaching me how to Triple Jump minutes before my turn. Just imagine doing hopscotch, at a full sprint, and then last minute you have to jump forward. That’s Triple Jump. It’s awkward, it doesn’t make sense. And unfortunately, I was up next, so there wasn’t enough time to leave a scathing review on Satan’s Yelp.
I hurried over to the mark, where I took a couple of deep breaths, trying to remember what I had just learned. There were lots of people lined up watching, expecting something great from what they thought was a top varsity athlete. Before I even started, I knew I would disappoint them. I had already forgotten how to do Satan’s jump. My mind had gone completely blank, and everything I had learned from just moments ago disappeared. So I added in a jump here, a skip there, and sprinkled running in between it all, until I had finally reached the line where I leapt into the sand pit, rejoicing that it was all over.
I stood up from the pit, when I realized the judge was staring at me with a look of surprise on his face. He seemed too stunned to speak. In that split second, I misinterpreted his surprise for admiration. I naively began to think that I had actually done really well, maybe even broken a record on my first try!
These thoughts came to a screeching halt when he asked, “What was that? What jump was that?” I told him, “Triple Jump,” and his face quickly shifted from surprise to absolute confusion. He shook his head, grabbed his pen, and scribbled down my score. Hoping to avoid any further questions, I took his moment of distraction and ran as far away from the jumps area as I could.
Shockingly, I was never asked to do Triple Jump again. However, I was asked to compete in other events… events I had neither been trained in nor tried before, but apparently that’s an insignificant detail when you’re seemingly the only person available to do them.
And that’s the power of being a Dasani athlete. Opportunities just knock at your door… the only drawback is it’s the stuff you’re not interested in at all, but still an opportunity is an opportunity, right? (Speaking of opportunities, do you want to upgrade your life? Want to make more money this month than your ancestors made in their entire lives combined? Join my essential oils team to make the impossible possible. Tell your friends, especially the vulnerable ones. DM me for more info.)
Anyways, back on track! This time my coach asked me to sub in for the 4x400m, a 4-person relay race where each person runs one lap around the track while holding a baton, which is passed off to each team member. I’ve heard students lovingly call the 4x400m cute things like “pure hell,” or “every time I run the 4x400m I throw up.” But for some reason, I still felt this strange confidence about it. Maybe it was because I sprinted to first period almost daily, so I felt like I had some training under my belt. I mean, how difficult could one lap around the track really be?
Spoilers: excruciatingly difficult.
Little did I know, there is a lot more strategy in the 400m than simply running as fast as you can. Apparently, you’re supposed to “pace yourself” (whatever that means), otherwise you will hit a wall and you will die. But I didn’t know this. I also didn’t know that my dad and boyfriend, at the time, had come to cheer me on.
Some background on my dad, he’s a Voss kind of athlete. He did the Decathlon in high school and in college. He’s trained with Bruce Jenner and other Olympians. And to this day when we go biking, his endurance knows no end. While I’m taking water breaks left and right, he’s riding up a mountain face as a warmup. To sum it up, he’s a sporty guy.
And now my high school boyfriend. We’ll call him something random like Usain Bolt, Usain for short. During Usain’s senior year (my junior year), he last minute tried out for track and field, and turned out to be an incredibly gifted 400m runner. He helped his team win state and was praised endlessly by his coaches and peers. After Usain graduated high school, he went on to do track and field in college. If you completely ignore the entire middle and end of our track careers, we basically have the same story.
But enough with those track stars, back to me!
So there I am, on the track with my relay team, waiting for the gun to go off. My stomach’s in knots because I’m so nervous. When the gun fires, the first leg runners take off. Everyone’s cheering them on, students on the sidelines, parents in the bleachers—it’s a full house.
I’m running the third leg for my team, so I’m waiting for my teammate who was running the second part. Once she gets close enough, I dart onto the track, grab the baton, and bolt. For the first time since joining track, I feel confident about what I’m doing. I’m full out sprinting, I’m giving it everything I have. I finally feel like I deserve the varsity uniform I’m wearing…until I hit the wall.
Surprisingly, regularly running to first period is not enough training for the 400m. Neither were the jumps workouts that consisted of sprints no longer than 15 seconds. It’s early on that my sprint turns into a run, which doesn’t concern me at first because I’m still a little ahead of the other runners (all thanks to my teammates). But as soon as I pass the halfway mark, my body starts shutting down. Suddenly Eminem’s lyrics, “palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy,” have never felt so relevant.
At best, I’m slow jogging down the final straight to my teammate. The other runners passed me a while ago, so it’s just me, myself, and I, shuffling towards the finish line. We’re having a heated discussion that if one of us gives in to the leg cramps and starts walking, they’ll never be forgiven. Things are tense.
Finally I pass off the baton, and I scamper off the track to collapse in the grass. Lying on my back, I’m fully expecting my lungs to catch fire and explode. My whole body begins to feel really stiff, like I’m turning into a piece of plywood. The end must be near.
Turns out the end was not near because anywhere from 3 minutes to 3 days later, I was surprised when I saw my dad and Usain walking over to me, as they helped me up from what I thought would be my final resting place.
Both were lying through their teeth Both were saying how proud they were of me, congratulating me on running my first varsity event. I, of course, took it all in with immense grace and humility. Nodding my head instead of speaking, because talking took too much effort at that point. Not long after this, my dad heads out, and Usain and I are just talking when he reveals something to me.
During the relay race, my dad had mistaken my high school’s top 400m runner (she’s total Smart Water material) for me. My dad had completely lost his mind when he saw “his daughter” winning the race, never had he seen me run like that before. His shock factor would be comparable to the actors tasting I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter in a commercial, full of wonder, disbelief, and astonishment. Only my dad was thinking, I Can’t Believe It’s My Daughter!
He was cheering and yelling, “GO JESSICA!!” jumping up and down, clapping his hands, even whistling, as “I” breezed past the competition, leading “my” team to victory. Even commenting to Usain that the 4x400m was my race.
While in reality, the 4x400m was absolutely not my race. If only he had looked far enough down the track, he would’ve seen me, the Dasani athlete, huffing and puffing, red in the face, ages behind everyone else, leading her team straight to the participation ribbons.
I didn’t ask questions on how Usain broke the news to my dad, but apparently, my dad accepted it very quickly. A real Occam’s Razor situation. Similar to if someone told you Prince Andrew was a vampire, you wouldn’t need a lot of convincing to believe it. It just makes sense.
And even though my sudden track talent didn’t make any logical sense, I completely understand why my dad mistook Smart Water for me. Apart from our massive disparity in athletic skill, we look similar, (especially from a distance) white, blonde hair, similar builds…we’re basically the blonde Annie and Hallie in Parent Trap, only neither of us is allergic to strawberries.
My dad had unknowingly boarded a one-way train to disappointment that day, but I’m sure those precious moments of him genuinely thinking I was a track star, will live rent free in his mind forever. So in a way, his mistake was the best gift I could ever hope to give him.
Sometimes I wonder if my track coach ever regretted letting me on the team. Perhaps thinking that disqualifying jumps couldn’t have been worse than watching me compete and represent our school that season.
But when these thoughts of doubt and negativity creep into my mind, I remember this: I was great in my coach’s eyes at something. Out of the entire track team, he named me, a rookie(!), Least Dedicated Player of the Year.
So, if I had the chance to do it all over again, and I mean all of it: the easy workouts, the low expectations, the minimal hours, even the farmer’s tan, I would in a heartbeat. I’d endure it a hundred more times if it meant I’d be LDP again, because being #1 is a rare thing for a Dasani athlete like me.