Joplin, Missouri - No place like it

As some of you might know my little brother, David, is a phenomenal runner. He began running his junior year of high school and has excelled through college. David runs for St. Edward's University in Austin, Texas. The past two years he has taken first place in Conference which has prompted him Regionals. At the beginning of November he ran in Regionals and took home 7th place overall, but 1st place for individual runners. This placing meant he would be competing in Nationals for Division II NCAA Cross Country. When I heard the news I knew I had to find a way to get to Joplin, Missouri. Because there wasn't much time all flights were ridiculously expensive, so I knew I would be driving. After much convincing I found a friend, Ginger, to make the 11 hour drive to watch a 30(ish) minute race in good ole Joplin Missouri. Below are pictures chronically our road trip and David's race!

We're not in colorado any more! Probably the most exciting thing we saw in Kansas was this oil rig!

This is my little brother before the race. I think he was a little overwhelmed with me, my parents & Ginger! What can I say we were VERY excited!!

Ready to root David on!! I'm so proud of him!

And they're off! He always starts off in the back ... which always scares his cheering section.

A couple action shots of David running & me cheering him on

David & the CC coach after the race

NCAA Nationals!

When it was all said and done David placed 53rd out of 190. Almost the top quarter. This was the first year for St. Edward's cross country program to ever send a runner to Nationals. Because his school doesn't have spring track, he will be running in 5Ks & 10Ks next semester and gearing up for his senior & final semester of running cross country next fall. We're still not quite sure where he got his running from but we are so proud of him nonetheless!

Our last picture of the trip ... wheat fields in Kansas with my car's shadow! Thank goodness we're not in Kansas any more :)