Christilaw: 400-meter runners take one for the team

There’s a certain amount of shame involved with this confession, but I used to tell anyone that cared to inquire that the only sport I liked less than track was, well, field.

Back in the day, when soccer was an up-and-coming sport breaking onto the scene, I set out to make myself knowledgeable about the game so that I would have a built-in excuse to not cover track. It worked, and I have come to really enjoy the game.

But I was wrong to not give track (and field) the credit it so richly deserves.

My problem with track had nothing to do with the sport.

Truth be told, I have always thought one of the most graceful things in the world of sports is a 300-meter hurdler running the curve. I like to position myself there so that I can hear the sound of the runner’s footsteps as they harness both speed and grace.

I swear, you can tell the really good ones by the sound they make going over a hurdle – the rhythm of their stride breaks ever so slightly. The better the hurdler, the shorter the break.

It takes a level of knowledge of the sport to put performances in context. I didn’t have that and let that keep me away from one of the world’s most ancient sports.

But I’ll let you in on a secret. You don’t need that much context to enjoy the kids who excel at the sport. You just need to listen to, and share, what motivates them.

You would think that, with so many events and so much specialization, track isn’t that much of a team sport.

If that’s what you think, I suggest you stand in the infield during the final relay event at a league meet. But be careful, you could get trampled by kids running from one side of the track to the other, following their teammates and urging them to run faster.

Or you could just watch an online video of last week’s Big Sky Conference track and field championships at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley.

Senior Shelby Erdahl ran her final 400 hurdles as an Idaho State Bengal.

Any race at that distance, be it a sprint or hurdles, takes a special level of toughness. Unlike the 100- and 200-meter races, the human body doesn’t take well to sprinting for a full lap around the track and it tends to go into oxygen debt before you reach the finish.

But oxygen debt wasn’t Shelby Erdahl’s problem. Early in the race she suffered a complete rupture of her left Achilles’ tendon, and by the first turn she was nowhere to be seen as the field headed toward the back stretch.

Anyone with a lick of sense would have stopped running once that happened. The pain would have pretty much insisted on it.

But abandoning the race would have cost Idaho State a precious team point.

So rather than letting her teammates down, Erdahl kept going, gingerly taking step after oh-so-painful step. Instead of gracefully gliding over each hurdle, she had to step over each one on a left foot that wanted very much to not have weight put on it.

How painful each step, each hurdle was for her was written plainly on Shelby Erdahl’s face. Tears traced her pain and disappointment with each step.

The rest of the field had long ago crossed the finish line when Erdahl got to the final straight, and when she, too, crossed the line she was met by teammates and opponents alike – a hurdler from Montana State took her arm to help her off the track.

It’s a difficult video to watch, but it’s the kind of performance you come to expect from athletes who put team ahead of self.

After you’ve watched Erdahl, do a Google search on retired sprinter Derek Redmond, who holds the British record at 400-meters.

In the semifinals of the 400 at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Redmond fired out of the blocks and was in good form heading into the middle part of the race.

And then his hamstring gave way.

Redmond went down from the searing pain of his injury, but with medical staff and race officials trying to help and comfort him, he got up and began limping around the track. A race official tried to stop him, but he brushed past him and continued to make his way painfully around the track.

Somewhere in the final curve a man muscled his way past security and want to Redmond’s side. It was his father, Jim Redmond.

“You don’t have to do this,” he told his son.

“Yes I do,” Derek said.

So they finished together, father and son with tears streaming down their faces.

It’s one of those Olympic moments that shows what it means to never give up. And how there are times when we all need someone to lean on.

Steve Christilaw can be reached at steve. christilaw@gmail.com.