I'd been biting my tongue about his attitude... until Wednesday's game. He wanted to walk in as many kids as possible, because the kids at this age aren't great at pitching. He tells the kids not to swing at the pitches, and bets on the fact that they'll probably end up with a walk. Walks may get them to the base, but it's not fun for either team! He told Eli not to swing at anything, and I thought that was ridiculous. Why play baseball if you don't try to hit the ball? I told Eli just to swing at anything that looked like a good pitch, and not to worry about it.
Well, Eli swung and missed, and his coach was pissed. I saw him whispering to Eli, and then Eli came over to me with tears in his eyes and said the coach told him that he has to run 10 laps for listening to me (his mother) instead of him (the coach). My blood felt like it was boiling when Eli told me that--I couldn't believe it. I told the coach that Eli wasn't going to be running any laps, and the coach said he was going to "ask Eli not to come to any more of the games" then.
The team only has 10 players, and only 8 of them regularly show up--just barely enough to play. Without Eli, they'd have to forfeit. And Eli is their best pitcher. I called Jerry, and he left Noah's game to come over (he was furious, too). He stayed after the game to talk to the coach, who told him that he was teaching the kids discipline, and he was going to make his own son run 200 laps around their house for the mistakes he made during the game.
Say what?!
It was 85 degrees outside, and these kids are 9-10 years old. I felt really sorry for the coach's son. I decided that I was going to write a letter to the athletic director (I'm better at writing than I am explaining over the phone). I wrote down everything that had happened, and I drove it to the township hall yesterday. When the athletic director read it, he gave me a call, and thankfully, he was very concerned about the whole thing.
He said that the coach isn't allowed to "punish" kids by making them run (or anything like that) and that summer ball is non-competitive and all about having fun. He also said that the coach doesn't even have the authority to kick Eli off the team. He was very grateful for the letter, and said he was going to handle everything this weekend, so that Monday's game will be a fun one. I'm really glad to have that taken care of, because it's been bothering me ever since the first game when we saw his coach's true colors.
Noah's coach (who I really like) has been kind enough to let Eli practice with his team, which is great for Eli. Eli just wants to play baseball, and he'll take any opportunity he can get to play. This morning, they had practice from 10-12, so I decided to go for a run while they were practicing. The field where they practice is halfway to the Metropark from my house, so I dropped them off at practice and then I went to the Metropark to run on the bike path.
The bike path is three miles, so I was going to do an out-and-back for a total of six miles. It was hot and sunny outside today (80 degrees), so I decided to just run very easy, not worrying about heart rate or pace. After the first mile, I remembered a badge on Smashrun that you can earn for doing "steady" 10K's--running a 10K or longer with a pace variable of less than 5% (they also have a badge for 4% variability and one for 3% variability). I decided to see if I could get the most even splits possible.
My first mile was 10:30, so after that, I just aimed to keep a 10:30 pace throughout the run. I wasn't sure if Smashrun looked at just the mile splits or if the variability was calculated some other way--I guessed it was from mile splits. Toward the end of each mile, I'd check my pace lap pace and adjust accordingly so that my split times were as close to 10:30 as possible. I was feeling REALLY good on the run, so I decided to add another mile on the way out, making the total run eight miles instead of six.
My mile splits were almost spot-on at 10:30. When I got back to the car at mile eight, I felt amazing. It was a really good run today! My heart rate was a little higher than normal (150 versus 146 bpm), because I usually run at whatever pace keeps my heart rate low, but today, I was focused on keeping the pace steady, and my heart rate rose during the run.
My splits were super even, though!
I was excited to upload it to Smashrun, but it turns out they look at the run as a whole and judge the variability from that--so mine was 5% (good enough to count toward one badge, but not the others). Now that I know, I'll have to try to keep a super steady pace to earn the others, and not just focus on the mile splits. This was my longest run since I was training for my 10K, and I felt really good.
Despite it being 80 degrees, I was surprised that I wasn't all that sweaty. When I looked at the weather app, I noticed the humidity was only 38%--no wonder! I never would have felt that good if the humidity was the usual 80+%.
We have a very busy weekend, so I probably won't post again until Sunday or Monday. Tomorrow, Jerry's employer is taking all of the employees (and their families) to the Detroit Zoo, so we'll be going with the boys. Tomorrow night, we're going to our friends' house for a party. Sunday, we're spending the day with Jerry and then heading to my parents' house for dinner for Father's Day. I hope everyone has a great weekend!
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