Follow senior Will Shafer as he embarks on his senior season at Gray New Gloucester HS. Shafer is one of the top distance runners in the state, he was the Class B state champion in the 800m, and ran the second fastest 1600m in the state in 2013. Shafer finished 10th in the Class B XC state championship last fall, see what he's doing to get to the next level
Hello everyone!
Sorry about the delay with this blog, the start of the school year has been a little hectic to say the least. This feels like the grind time for seniors. Applications are being assembled, schools visited, tests taken and recommendation letters requested. On top of school and sports, this makes for a rather stressful fall. In addition to these activities, I'm working out the logistics of a couple of official visits at a couple of colleges. For those who don't know, an official visit is an overnight on campus where you attend classes, stay in the dorms, go to practice with the team and have all of your expenses covered for by the college! My first visit is at Brown University next weekend, something that I have been looking forward to since the summer!
As far as XC, it has been a great start to the season. This fall I'm trying to train hard, but also enjoy the sport more. In the past I would always get too worked up on race days, these nerves would completely take the fun out of racing. While I would like to have a strong season, I want to enjoy what could be my last season of cross (I might just be running track in college). I actually believe this more relaxed, happy-go-lucky attitude has helped me with races. I can honestly say this is the first season I actually look forward to XC meets and feel comfortable racing on a surface other than a rubber oval. In addition to racing, I enjoy the social aspect of meets. I'm what one might call a social runner. Over social media I keep in contact with a lot of running friends (SnapChat anybody?), nevertheless, meeting runners from other teams in person is something that can't be emulated. Thus, I try to catch up with as many friends from other schools as I can at meets and maybe make a couple new friends along the way.
In an unrelated matter, I recently decided to try and see how long I could grow my hair. Maybe get some serious flow going for the indoor track season. I was thinking along the lines of Evan Jager. I'm on month four of the no haircut challenge, if anyone wants to join in on this little challenge I would be happy to have company.
Keep it flowing, Will
