Nothing really exciting happened this week. When the weekend rolled around, we didn't have a race, so we decided to make our own excitement.

It was Friday night, and Chad, Kevin, and I were looking for something to do. After searching "things to do when you're bored" on Google, we eventually settled on the idea of a PowerAde drinking contest. (People have died from drinking too much water, so we decided that it would be a safer idea to drink something with electrolytes.) To make things more interesting, we decided to see who would be able to drink the most AND hold their pee. We got a 24 pack of PowerAde and made some rules.

1. Each of us had 10 minutes to drink a 20 oz. PowerAde.

2. We had to drink a minimum of five bottles.

3. Each PowerAde we drank over the five-bottle minimum counted as a 10-minute deduction from the pee-holding time.

4. The ten minute time limit ended after the five bottle minimum.

5. Each of us would drink a 12 oz. cup of coffee (in 15 minutes) before we started drinking the PowerAdes.

6. Whoever held their pee the longest would be the winner.

We gathered our PowerAde and a deck of cards, and headed down to the PSU to start our quest.

We decided to play a version of rummy to pass the time and keep our minds off of our stomachs and bladders. I started a timer and we began sipping our drinks. The coffee was easy. So was the first PowerAde. And the second. The third seemed a little harder. By the fourth, we couldn't believe how quickly ten minutes had passed. But then we were on to the fifth, and done with our minimum.

Chad and I were both feeling pretty full, but Kevin showed no fear and opened a sixth bottle. I was somewhere in between having a full bladder and a full stomach, but I knew that I could handle another PowerAde. I also knew that if I drank another one, Chad would have to drink one too, because he wouldn't back down from the challenge. So I opened a sixth, and so did Chad. Since all of us drank the optional PowerAde, we negated any time deduction. (For those of you counting, this is 132 oz., or just over 1 gallon of liquid, consumed in 75 minutes.)

After six, I decided to stop because my bladder and stomach both felt like they were 110% full. Once again, Kevin opened up another bottle, and drank it like he was thirsty. Chad opened up another bottle and began drinking too. I crossed my legs and thought about the desert.

Chad stopped after seven bottles, but Kevin drank two more, bringing his total up to nine. Around the same time Kevin started his eighth bottle, I began to get up and pace around to try to take my mind off of the pressure in my bladder. I noticed that I was very bloated, and I was talking very fast, probably from the caffeine. After an hour and a half I decided I had had enough. I was not going to win and I did not want to be comfortable while I lost (though technically I got third place). I came back to the card table to watch Chad and Kevin battle it out for first.

About a half hour after I quit, Kevin and Chad decided to call it quits. This meant that Kevin was the winner, because he had earned 20 minutes in time deductions. We congratulated Kevin on his victory, but he was not feeling as happy about it as we were. I think that we were all just excited to go to the bathroom like normal again.



The rest of this week was fairly normal as well. We had a lighter schedule because we have a Friday race. This was nice because we didn't have to run on Wednesday morning, and instead we got to sleep in. Also on Wednesday, we had our annual phone-a-thon, hosted by Chip Wilson. If we didn't call you but you would like to make a tax-deductable donation to support our team, please let me know. Or you can keep your money and buy something cool. Like a Chia Pet. Or a snow cone machine. Or a harp. But if you already have all those things and like college athletics, we appreciate donations. And snow cones.

This weekend, our race is at Wilmington College. As I have said before, this course is one of the team favorites, and we usually run fast times there. There will be 37 other teams there this year, so things will be interesting. Hopefully, we still have good races so that we have a good way to start off fall break.

Meet the rest of the team:

Name: Kevin James Poast

Hometown: Mount Gilead, Ohio

Major: Communications Major, Intercultural studies minor

Favorite food: Lasagna

Favorite cross country course: St. Thomas Aquinas, Michigan

Favorite movie: The Prestige

Favorite running quote: "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you always got" - Steve Seif (High school swimming coach)

Crazy running story: This one time, I was running on a morning run with the guy's team. We decided to run the three mile loop around the block. As we approached mile 1.5, Nate began to talk about how he wished something crazy would happen so he could write a blog about it. We all chuckled and continued to run. 400 meters or less after that statement, We ran past this house with a cinder block porch and this woman starts screaming bloody murder from on top of the porch. "help HELP someone help me" was her passionate plea. Being the chivalrous, upstanding gentlemen that we are, we stopped and ran to her aid. As soon as we got close though, things started going downhill. "There are men hiding under the porch, and they're trying to kill me!", she whispered none to softly. "I've been on this porch all night" she continued. *sigh.....* "Ma'am there is no one under the porch, in fact you can't even get under the porch", Jake said. Not a single one of us could talk her down, nor convince her that no one was trying to kill. "YES THEY ARE", she persisted, "And if you leave, you'll be guilty for my DEATH!". I paused... in the back of mind I weighed the consequences. Just as I was about to decide that I cared little for holding her "fate" in my hands, Mark spoke up, "We'll go call someone for you then." The next ten minutes were awkward as best and annoying at worst as her tale began to elaborate into a "transmitter" (Bluetooth ear bud), Her "hostage son" situation, and some kind of drugging by the neighbor. I was beginning to get cold, and my muscles were tightening up. As my patience wore thinner, finally Mark and Mitch returned from calling the police at a nice neighbor's house. The lady was gracious enough to let us use her phone at 6:30 in the morning as well as offering Mark and Mitch breakfast. I also hear that she was a beast of a solitaire player, But I digress... The police finally showed up and thanked us for doing our good deed for the day. He assured us that he would take care of it, so naturally we all booked it out of there before we could get guilted or trapped into anything else. The first few steps were silent. Then, we all busted up laughing and making all the jokes we could think of. Someone said, "Well Nate, I think you have something to write about now". "yeah, that was pretty ironic" someone else chimed in. "That wasn't ironic", Nate said, "That was (I forget the word...)"

Kevin Poast	Nate Winters

Name: Nate Winters

Hometown: Hilliard, Ohio

Major: Chemistry

Favorite food: Reese's

Favorite cross country course: Tom Sawyer Park, Lexington, KY

Favorite movie: The Bourne Trilogy

Favorite running quote: "As Denton's reputation grew, a number of undergraduate runners decided to train with him, thinking to pick up on the Secret… [After a few days] the awful truth would begin to dawn on him: there was no Secret! His days would have to be spent in exactly this manner, give or take a mile or two, for longer that he cared to think about, if he really wanted to see the olive wreath up close. It would simply be the most difficult heartrending process he would endure in the course of his life." –From Once A Runner, by John L. Parker, Jr.

"I hope a bear comes out of the woods and eats us!" –My friend Jared, after running about 23 miles of a marathon.

Crazy running story: When I was a sophomore in high school, we went to a cross country meet in Centerville, Ohio. I was with my friend Danny for the entire race, but he outsprinted me at the finish line. As we walked through the finish shoot they handed Danny a finisher's plaque. "Cool! I said. "We get plaques!" The volunteer then proceeded to hand me a finisher's ribbon. It turned out that only the top 15 finishers got plaques and I was 16th. I was kind of upset until Danny (who was a senior) told me he had never gotten any finisher's plaques his entire career, and that it meant a lot to him that I let him get the plaque. I didn't feel so bad after that.

Anything else you want the world to know about you: I have many hidden talents.