TWENTY ONE team points tallied at The Florida State High School Cross Country Championships! A FHSAA record for the fewest team points scored in a state meet since the inception of the “Fall Only” Cross Country Championship in 1954. On the morning of November 18, 1986, when Palmer’s fifth runner crossed the finish line in 7th place, it all came into focus for the coach of this “off the wall seven”, a team which undeniably must be considered one of the most unusual championship teams ever. Twenty one points totaled at a state meet was more outrageous than any coach could have dreamed of, in even his wildest of fantasies. Though twenty five years have passed since that day, not only does that record still stand, but so do the memories and lessons of that day - at least to those who were part of that infamous season.
The season did not really begin on September 8th 1986, when seven runners from Palmer School (a school of only 200 boys) defeated 25 schools at the University of Miami’s Greentree Invitational. Nor did the team’s momentum truly get rolling when this rag tag bunch defeated 51 schools of all sizes at the prestigious John I. Leonard Meet at John Prince Park. No, the seeds of this championship team were sown in the years prior. The seeds were sown from the hundreds of miles run on the hot, South Florida concrete. They were sown from the hills run during the team’s summer training camp in New Hampshire, and they were sown from the remembering the lingering disappointment of several “runner up” finishes leading up to the prolific 1986 race. After back to back Class A Cross Country “runner up” finishes in 1984 and 1985, it was apparent that 1986 would be Palmer’s year, the year of the “Off the Wall Seven” . To the coach, it was no surprise that by the time that the fall of 1986 had arrived, the stage was set, and that the comedic cast was ready to perform.
The job of “coach”, I felt, was to allow all of the individuals on a team to be loose, and to permit them to develop into the type of champions that each was destined to become. It was not the coach’s role, I believed,, to try to make each runner to conform to his standards, and to force each to “act and to run” in a certain way. What a year it could be for that coach with this talented group! I have always believed that being a champion first requires knowing who you are, and then staying the course. The individuals on this team certainly always knew who they were, and were comfortable with being rebellious. Cross country runners often rebel, so as to appear to some observers to be a “little out of the mainstream”. But for this team to conclude its season as the most dominant team in its classification in FHSAA State Meet history, it was only fitting for these guys to be “way” out of the mainstream. In fact, these guys swam in their own stream.
The “off the wall seven” possessed an identity and image that were reflected in their uniforms. Though the school had bought team uniforms five years earlier, there was a need for new ones in 1986. But although there was enough money for new football jerseys every year, cross country jerseys needed to last 5 years. Such logic may make sense to conformists - but not to this team. The 1986 Palmer Cross Country team’s response to this line of reasoning -the design and printing of seven tank tops that read “Space for Rent” on the chest rather than Palmer School. Of course, this group of harriers needed to have shorts that matched their rebellious tops. After unanimously voting down the coach’s suggestion for plain green running shorts, the seniors went to a local dollar store, bought and ran in $1.00 Mickey Mouse Boxer shorts - yes that’s right - MIckey Mouse boxer shorts.
The uniforms were only the beginning of this group’s desire to assert its affably rebellious spirit. In the days before computer timing, when meets were often scored by tongue depressors given to runners standing in long lines in chutes, this group would take off their bib numbers after their race, and replace their names with titles such as Chuck Wagon and Frank N Stein before turning in their places. Somehow, we all lived in a less serious age back then, and the meet directors were usually laughing too hard to disqualify the kids. After one race, the team’s captains ordered a birthday gram to be sung to a beloved local meet director, but only after the meet director appeared to be getting fined by that same singer ( dressed as a policeman) for administering a meet in a public park without proper zoning. At another meet, before present day uniform rules, each runner painted his body with water paint to resemble his favorite Smurf, and subsequently proceeded to bleed his colors over the entire 3 mile course.
In retrospect, one might think that this group would have been perceived by their competitors as pompous and inappropriate . Upon hearing of their antics today, one would surmise that this group would have been disqualified on many occasions for sportsmanship issues. But just the opposite was true. In fact after every race, the other teams would mingle with this gang that couldn’t run straight, and actually warm up and cool down together. Other teams, and many other coaches, gravitated towards this magnetic bunch so as to see what shenanigans would come next.
This team left its mark all throughout South Florida in 1986. Losing only one race all year, to a strong AAAA team, on a day when the its fourth and fifth runners were being rested , Class A Palmer was the top team in all of South Florida that year, defeating many of the state’s powerhouses . But what was more important to the coach than the victories, was that this group defined a different way of achieving success; a philosophy that would guide his coaching philosophy for years to come.
It has now been twenty five years since the finest team race I ever saw was completed. Although I have not seen most of the “Off the Wall Seven” in those years, I have been blessed to have coached hundreds of other successful athletes and dozens of successful teams in the years since. Yet, to be honest, rarely does the week come when my thoughts do not drift back to the team that helped me learn the lessons that I would need to evolve into the coach I am today. When I retire from coaching some day, I am sure that no season will mean more to me than 1986 did.