NORTH VERNON
Just before the start of Saturday’s 5-kilometer Hoosier Hills Conference cross-country championships, Seymour’s No. 1 runner Kinsley Folsom looked down at her feet and spied a four-leaf clover.
She was convinced the discovery would give her and the Owls good fortune in the race. But it wasn’t that kind of day for Seymour, after all.
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While the team placed third, two runners were out with injuries, and Folsom did not run as fast as she wanted to and barely missed gaining all-conference honors by one place.
“It wasn’t the times we wanted,” said Folsom, who accented her purple Seymour uniform with pink knee socks and even that did not pay dividends, although it did gain her attention from afar.
“They’re bright,” Folsom said. “And I didn’t wash my purple ones.”
They were even brighter than Grace Lewis’ purple knee socks, which could not be seen from a mile away.
The Owls finished third in the team race won by Floyd Central with a dominating low score of 19 points and were just five points behind Columbus East even though Samantha Jacobi and Lillian Sunbury were sidelined.
Folsom was the Owls’ top finisher in 8th in 20 minutes, 15 seconds. Vivienne Siefker ran one of her finest races of the season, edging teammate Hayley Harpe by one second in 20:30 and by about one inch for 10th place after they ran most of the route together.
“I think we did a good job today,” said coach Spencer Sunbury. “We’ve had better days, but we ran strong today.”
Having two runners on the sidelines did not help and he hopes they will be back for the Sectional Saturday at Brown County.
“We’re hoping to get a couple of girls back,” Sunbury said. “I was happy with how everyone else stepped up.”
There is little doubt the Seymour runners ran until it hurt based on their sprawling and gasping for breath at the finish-line.
“Honestly, I went out too hard,” Harpe said.
She and Stiefker spent so much time together they nearly became land- owner partners. Even though there were 61 runners in the race, and there was ebb and flow over the miles, they ended up next to one another repeatedly.
“We stuck together the whole time,” Harpe said. “Throughout the race we were encouraging each other.”
There was no energy for in-depth conversation, but they had back-and-forths of limited commentary such as “Good job,” and “You got this, girl.”
The temperature in the 50s was milder than some early-in-the-week forecasts which predicted frost, but when the runners arrived early for the 9 a.m. start there was just enough chill in the air to notice.
“I was freezing,” said Lewis, who did work up a sweat running 22:57. “It wasn’t as bad when we ran.”
Lewis said there was a bonus value behind her choice of high socks on this day.
“In the cold, they help a lot,” she said.
There were definitely mixed omens involved with this team Saturday. Folsom’s four-leaf clovers did not bring good fortune, but Lewis was certain her new-look socks aided her in clocking her fastest time.
“It was definitely the socks,” Lewis said. “They were lucky charms.”
Folsom thought she knew all about such things. One day at practice she found two four-leaf clovers on the same day. She has pondered how best to preserve them, perhaps laminating them and putting them into a scrapbook.
“I’m going to start doing that at every race,” she said.
That’s because Folsom expects to find good luck on the ground before every race left this season.