Well, the main event of Cross Country occurred on Oct. 22nd, the State Championships! The team has been working for that day for a long time, try 5 months, and for some of us for a year! It was definitely worth all the hard work and effort we put into it! Our team did really well, we finished 4th out of the 5A schools in the state! We had amazing performances by everyone, particularly two of our runners that finished in the top 20, out of something like 120! Jason Lynch ran the race of his life running a 15:44 at the state course to finish.... SECOND!!! Yep our own Jason Lynch finished second in the 5A State Cross Country Championship Race! Daniel was our other top 20 finisher finishing 19th with an insane time of 16:24!! Josh Kennedy finished 28th with another freaking amazing time of 16:34! Matt Lynch finished 55th with a time of 17:05! I finished 74th with a time of 17:20 (there you go Andrew, I mentioned myself :)! Kevin Lynch A FRESHMAN finished 80th with a time of 17:28! And Brad Marshall finished 84th with a time of 17:37! It was an amazing year, and we just about all got our fastest times of the year! Oh, and by the way, 3 of us our juniors (Daniel, me, and Brad), and TWO ARE SOPHOMORES (Josh and Matt), and one is A FRESHMAN (Kevin), and of course Jason is our Senior, the capitan (spelled that way on purpose)! Our sophomores and freshman have really shocked me, and to use our coaches saying "Shocked the world!" They're amazing runners, and for all of them, and Brad as well, this is their first year running cross country, that's pretty amazing! It was an amazing race, and we're looking forward to track as well as next year of cross country, we're going to work our hardest and perform to our best, and well, we'll see what happens, and whatever it is, it's going to be good, we have a great group of guys! And I'd like to give a big thanks to our alternates Ryan Gregorson and Andrew Forrest! Those guys are awesome, they ran with us every day after Region even though they might not get to run! Thanks a bunch guys!
This race was especially important to me because I learned a little bit more about myself, as well as what it takes to be a good racer. Similar to Andrew's realizations at region my happened at State. In a way I conquered myself I finally believed I was capable of running well, and well when you believe good things happened, I PR'd! I definitely still have a lot of room for improvement, but I started to make some steps towards figuring myself out, as well as figuring out how to race. It was a race of realization. The source of my inspiration? Check out this video at YouTube, it's inspiring! Go Bill Mills!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlF4OdDZnLE
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Abortion
I have recently learned about something so horrible and disgusting that I can hardly believe it's real. Partial birth abortion was, until recently, allowed in the United States. For those that do not know what partial birth abortion is, it is defined as
"An abortion in which the person performing the abortion, deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living fetus until, in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother, or, in the case of breech presentation, any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother, for the purpose of performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus; and performs the overt act, other than completion of delivery, that kills the partially delivered living fetus. (18 U.S. Code 1531)"
In 2003 the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was passed and ratified as constitutional, this of course bans partial abortion. However, Senator Obama has pledged that his first act, if he were to be elected President of the United States would be to "sign the freedom of choice act". This act would legalize Partial birth abortion. I cannot see how this in any way can be seen as morally or ethically correct. How is it that we could allow for innocent children to be murdered even as they take their first breath. Even for those of you who are pro-choice, this cannot seem right. One of the major issues surrounding the issue of abortion is the question of when life begins, whether in the fetus, or at birth. How than can it be said, even for those that are pro-choice, that a baby taking it's first breath, it's head out of the womb, born into this world, is not alive, but is merely "a fetus"and is no longer a living human being? Can a child be only partially alive, and thus justify a "partial" birth abortion, I think not. I cannot see how one could possibly agree with such blatant murder of innocent babes. It cries out against every moral belief or standard on this earth. How could such a thing have existed in our society, and how could we ever allow it to happen again? America, it's supposed to be the land of freedom, of opportunity, of justice, of peace, yet it seems that in this respect it is all a lie. When the people of America are largely supporting a man who has claimed that his very first act will be to legalize such an atrocity, then I believe that the people of America are not looking closely enough at his moral values, nor their own. A land of opportunity, yet we kill children before they have a chance to even see the world and barely take a breath, a land of freedom, and we take the freedom from the future of America, her children, and a place of justice and peace, and yet we seek to elect a man who will legalize the murder of innocent children. It is not right, we are better than that, we cannot condone such atrocities within our own nation. We must stand up for that which is right, and speak out against such a possibility, that again our nation could legalize the murder of babes just born, yet considered only "partially alive".
We should each seek to speak out against the evils that exist in this world that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values. We cannot sit idly by and watch as laws may be passed that will allow abortions, gay marriages, or any other evils that seek to destroy the values of our nation. It is not right, it is our moral imperative to speak out against such things, and to advocate for a raise in our nations seemingly declining moral standards.
Do not misunderstand me, our nation still does much good throughout the world. We are involved in many relief efforts that save lives, and help to bring peace and security to impoverished states of the world, as well as much more. We therefore cannot allow ourselves to fall into a trap that will lead to a decline in everything that America stands for, we simply cannot.
http://frcactionpac.org/
(support the American people in maintaining the ban on Partial Birth Abortion, and further speak out against abortion, and other such beliefs that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values)
"An abortion in which the person performing the abortion, deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living fetus until, in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother, or, in the case of breech presentation, any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother, for the purpose of performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus; and performs the overt act, other than completion of delivery, that kills the partially delivered living fetus. (18 U.S. Code 1531)"
In 2003 the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was passed and ratified as constitutional, this of course bans partial abortion. However, Senator Obama has pledged that his first act, if he were to be elected President of the United States would be to "sign the freedom of choice act". This act would legalize Partial birth abortion. I cannot see how this in any way can be seen as morally or ethically correct. How is it that we could allow for innocent children to be murdered even as they take their first breath. Even for those of you who are pro-choice, this cannot seem right. One of the major issues surrounding the issue of abortion is the question of when life begins, whether in the fetus, or at birth. How than can it be said, even for those that are pro-choice, that a baby taking it's first breath, it's head out of the womb, born into this world, is not alive, but is merely "a fetus"and is no longer a living human being? Can a child be only partially alive, and thus justify a "partial" birth abortion, I think not. I cannot see how one could possibly agree with such blatant murder of innocent babes. It cries out against every moral belief or standard on this earth. How could such a thing have existed in our society, and how could we ever allow it to happen again? America, it's supposed to be the land of freedom, of opportunity, of justice, of peace, yet it seems that in this respect it is all a lie. When the people of America are largely supporting a man who has claimed that his very first act will be to legalize such an atrocity, then I believe that the people of America are not looking closely enough at his moral values, nor their own. A land of opportunity, yet we kill children before they have a chance to even see the world and barely take a breath, a land of freedom, and we take the freedom from the future of America, her children, and a place of justice and peace, and yet we seek to elect a man who will legalize the murder of innocent children. It is not right, we are better than that, we cannot condone such atrocities within our own nation. We must stand up for that which is right, and speak out against such a possibility, that again our nation could legalize the murder of babes just born, yet considered only "partially alive".
We should each seek to speak out against the evils that exist in this world that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values. We cannot sit idly by and watch as laws may be passed that will allow abortions, gay marriages, or any other evils that seek to destroy the values of our nation. It is not right, it is our moral imperative to speak out against such things, and to advocate for a raise in our nations seemingly declining moral standards.
Do not misunderstand me, our nation still does much good throughout the world. We are involved in many relief efforts that save lives, and help to bring peace and security to impoverished states of the world, as well as much more. We therefore cannot allow ourselves to fall into a trap that will lead to a decline in everything that America stands for, we simply cannot.
http://frcactionpac.org/
(support the American people in maintaining the ban on Partial Birth Abortion, and further speak out against abortion, and other such beliefs that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values)
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Region!!!
Well we recently had region, everyone else has given a pretty good rendition, so I'll just give another brief overview :) Our team ran an amazing race! We placed second in our region! Last year was the first time we went to state in over a decade, and now look at us, second in our region! It's so fun, and amazing that we've been able to accomplish so much. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to our coach, Senor Olsen, he turned the cross country program at Hillcrest, and he's pushed us to perform, and become the best we can possibly be, and he genuinely cares about the sport, and about us.
Jason ran an amazing race! After losing to the Alta pack for two races in a row Jason decided it was enough, and figured he'd just go win the race! He ran an amazing race, and ended up beating the entire Alta pack by a huge margin, becoming The Region II Cross Country Champion!!! Our whole team is so dang proud of that kid, he's amazing! Daniel and Josh also did amazingly well on our team, finishing 6th and 10th, giving us three runners in the top ten, Insane! Everyone else did amazing as well, I can't believe the Lynch family, they're insane! Brad is as well, just look at his blog, he's amazingly awesome!
State's on the 22nd, and we'll be ready to roll!
Jason ran an amazing race! After losing to the Alta pack for two races in a row Jason decided it was enough, and figured he'd just go win the race! He ran an amazing race, and ended up beating the entire Alta pack by a huge margin, becoming The Region II Cross Country Champion!!! Our whole team is so dang proud of that kid, he's amazing! Daniel and Josh also did amazingly well on our team, finishing 6th and 10th, giving us three runners in the top ten, Insane! Everyone else did amazing as well, I can't believe the Lynch family, they're insane! Brad is as well, just look at his blog, he's amazingly awesome!
State's on the 22nd, and we'll be ready to roll!
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