Clay Cross Country Building For Future

In his first season coaching cross country, Clay County High’s Jermaine McElvain said his team’s effort and the sport’s camaraderie has him hooked.

Before this year, McElvain spent nearly a decade holding various basketball coaching positions throughout the Upper Cumberland, he still serves as an assistant for the boy’s and girl’s at Clay High and is the head girl’s coach for Celina K-8. He said the biggest difference in the two sports is the friendliness between teams and uplifting atmosphere at meets.

“I’ve seen runners encourage other runners, other coaches encourage other runners from different schools,” McElvain said. “And honestly, you don’t see that a lot in different sports. But I feel like in cross country that’s one thing that I’ve seen a lot. It’s kind of like everybody, even though we have on a different singlet or uniform, everybody has one ultimate goal and that’s to finish the race the best way you can.”

The Bulldogs have finished middle of the pack in most of their meets, but it is his team’s drive to improve that has McElvain encouraged. He said a lot of his runners are eager to learn and that this year has been a learning experience for both he and the runners.

“At the end of the day, for my kids are doing a lot of learning this year,” McElvain said. “And going to these different meets and racing against these other, smaller schools, bigger schools, they’re seeing what it takes to really lock in and really focus.”

With his team consisting of nine freshman and three seniors, McElvain said he is excited for the future of the cross country program. He said he is looking forward to when his current freshman are juniors and seniors and seeing their growth as runners and leaders of the program.

As a high school cross country athlete himself, McElvain said it comes down to the runners themselves creating and achieving goals and not having everything laid out for them.

“The thing I tell the players is I’m just here to help you along the way,” McElvain said. “This is your program, we can do what you want to do and be as good or as average or however you want to look at it, and I’m just here to guide you along the way.”

McElvain said he already has hopes to create a youth cross country program in Clay County so once runners reach high school, they are already with the program and know the expectations.