At one mile into the Division 1 Boys Race, Fort Collins was well-established at the front of the page. They would stay that way. Photo by Jeff McCoy.
I hadn’t been to a Liberty Bell since 2004, my first season coaching in Colorado, and there had been plenty of motivations for why. The truth probably lay somewhere between brilliant coaching strategy and abject fear of mismanaging the opportunities and risks that await Liberty Bell participants.
Still, I took my teams back in 2011. And it didn’t take long to figure out why this meet generates so much buzz here in Colorado, throughout the region, and also garners attention nationally. Say what you want about it, most kids love this race and when you get something like 2000 teenagers that excited about a sporting event all in the same place, fun things usually happen. Sun greeted the teams to Heritage High School, but a nice thin blanket of clouds soon rolled in, making the race conditions pretty favorable to hyped-up...