Across Country and Cross Country

One I drove and one I shot. Guess which! I have been on a road trip to New York to deliver my oldest son to begin a new job working in a limo business owned by my wife’s uncle. Sound complicated? At least he is working with cars which is what he dreams about while both awake and asleep. I have never seen a young man so consumed with cars. So this is a good fit. The cross country part is where I actually took camera in hand and photographed a sport that I find even less interest in than I do in cars.

But this meet is a little different from your typical high school cross country meet. This is the Jesse Owens Classic, a massive event drawing high school cross country teams from across the region. I believe there were about 3,000 runners particpating in a series of 5K events set at the Oakville Indian Mounds Park a few miles outside Moulton, AL. The kids ran the event just a stones throw from where the famed Olympian and truly great American Jesse Owens was born in a little share croppers shack. Back in 1996, the county finally got around to building a museum and park in his name. The Olympic torch run passed through the park which probably provided the incentive for the project. Nevertheless, there is a nice park and museum there now honoring his memory.

Technically, the event is pretty easy to shoot. As with most 5K events, you only have time to shoot the start and then hustle over to the finish and catch the runners coming in. The races only last from 15-20 minutes so there isn’t much time for anything else. I have done dozens of these races so I wanted something a little different than your typical starting line photo. I looked down the first stretch of the race and realized there was a bottleneck at the first turn. This meant that the runners would be bunched there and that might give me a nice shot. When I walked down, there was a nice little rise just behind the bottleneck that allowed me to have a couple of feet of elevation. Now I knew I had my shot.

I wanted to try some other spots along the course but with the short races and the need to get top finishers I was really limited to what I could do. The Indian mound would have made a nice vantage point for the last two turns of the race but it was closed off. This may seem a bit trivial but it is holy ground to the indian tribes. I have been up there a few times but it was usually to photograph some assembly of one of the tribes. Not a place, at any rate, to just bounce around on for a few photos.

I also found an excellent photo of a young man praying out in the parking area as I walked between the turn and the finish line. As it turns out he was of the Jewish faith and I shot some frames with a long lens. Then it was just a matter of waiting for him to finish to get his name. The photo is one of my favorite from the event because it shows a side of the cross country you don’t see just hanging around doing “race” photos.

This little story will give you a couple of good tips for shooting any kind of track event. First, scout as much as possible before the race and pick you some spots. If it is a 5K you will have to be really careful to pick spots that are close enough together to allow you to move between there and the finish in time to get your top finishers. Secondly, always keep your eyes open for the nice flavor photo. Everyone expects to see running. Give them something they don’t expect.