Much of the current running literature tends to focus on either exceptionally talented individuals or collegiate teams composed of elite runners. Yet across the country, the majority of competitive runners are not elite world-class athletes, but are high school runners who train and compete often with little chance of becoming a state champion or even fastest member of his team. In Marc Bloom's book God on the Starting Line: The Triumph of a Catholic School Running Team and Its Jewish Coach (Breakaway Books, Halcottsville New York 2004, $22.00), Bloom takes a look at what it is like to coach and be a part of a high-school cross-country team composed not of elite athletes, but individuals who are relatively new to the sport and at first hesitant to make the sacrifices necessary to improve.

As the title suggests, one of the many unique elements of this particular team and coach dynamic is that Bloom, a Jewish coach, is hired to coach at St. Rose, a Roman Catholic High school in New Jersey. While religion never serves as a major source of tension between Bloom and his athletes, the presence of a Jewish coach creates a unique situation for the athletes since many have never had a Jewish teacher or coach before. What is more of a challenge for this team, as with many high school teams, is that it is composed of individuals from such a wide range of backgrounds and motivations for running. The St. Rose team consists of everyone from a star basketball player running to stay in shape, to a boy struggling through his parents divorce, to an artist. Unlike a collegiate team in which the runners share a common interest in running and have a more similar background in training and racing, these athletes are a diverse group and, in addition to learning how to run, must learn how to accept each other and work together to grow into a successful team. Coach Bloom describes his struggles to assist his team in accomplishing this, though it is a slow and difficult process. As he describes at one point, "We are growing together like a family and, as in almost any family, there is love and dysfunction, energy and listlessness, trust and betrayal."

Bloom describes the journey of his team as it slowly but inconsistently improves throughout the season. While at the start the athletes are constantly complaining about the work and sometimes ignore his racing strategy, they grow to trust him and each other. Most importantly, Bloom stresses not only competing well and trying to win, but also using the sport to help the runners develop as individuals. As he says, "I want these boys to leave me not only as better runners but better people." In addition to describing the growth of his team, Bloom describes the parallel journey for himself as he uses his coaching to help deal with his ailing father and sense of loss having sent his daughter away to college. While he is the coach, Bloom finds himself learning much from his athletes as he describes at one point feeling that, "The gulf between teacher and student has shrunk to almost nothing." He finds that coaching involves teaching, but a great amount of learning as well.

Bloom also does a nice job taking a look at the individual personalities and actions of the athletes that make up his team. He describes each athlete and his background as the season goes on, stressing the leadership abilities possessed by each of his runners rather than focusing solely on his most talented runners. His athletes deal with a number of obstacles as the season progresses including dealing with a teammate involved with drugs, a top runner quitting the team, and an incident in which they push one of their teammates into the ocean and then fabricate a story about having saved someone. In each of these situations, Bloom describes his reactions and deals with his athletes and tries to address each situation in a fair way. He says, "I consider teaching, coaching, broadly in the rabbinical sense of imparting a spiritual grounding, a sure and simple path to unleash the power all kids have to succeed." He addresses negative situations, but rather than condemning the athletes involved, tries to use the situations as learning experiences to help his runners to improve themselves.

The story chronicles the season up through the state championships in which his team is extremely successful, and follows with a postscript in which it is learned that many of his athletes are continuing to run today. While at times Bloom's narrative falls into his preaching the merits of combining running with spirituality and his own development, he still succeeds in giving a nice glimpse into what it is like to coach and be a part of a high school team. This is a good book for anyone interested in coaching, but is also a nice look at a team of "normal" runners growing and achieving to the best of their ability.

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