“He was just talking about how fast he was, and I was like ‘Yeah, well I’m pretty fast.’ Then he challenged me to a race”. That is how Mr. Baird claims the origin of the Nelson vs. Baird race went. 

 Mr. Baird, a Southeast of Saline high school history and psychology teacher, and Mr. Nelson a Southeast of Saline high school math teacher wanted to race to see who could run faster so, Mr. Nelson challenged Mr. Baird to the race. Based on their longtime trash-talking rivalry, they decided they must compete to see who would come out on top. However, they didn’t want a simple shallow competition; they wanted to race for a good cause. The two teachers started to think about how to raise money for Trojans helping Trojans. This sparked the idea of creating fundraising buckets with each of their faces on a bucket. After a given period of time, whoever had more money in their bucket would have to run with a parachute attached to them. They planned to race during the 4th period. So many kids then found out about it and were going to skip their 4th hour to go. To address this, they then decided to have it in a seminar so anyone could come. 

Mr. Baird prepared for the race by running in football practice and stretching a few days before the race. He also, as a result of the run, pulled his hamstring. Mr. Baired states, “It was really fun, and it was really cool to see all the students out supporting the race.” Mr. Nelson ran the race with a parachute attached to him and he stated,” It was actually way more difficult than I thought it was going to be”. Mr. Nelson did not prepare for the race like Mr. Baird did. Mr. Nelson said he just goes to the gym regularly. Mr. Nelson states,  “I want to issue a challenge to any other teacher”.

According to the publications class, we agreed that Mr. Nelson should race Mr. Settle next.  When surveyed students agreed that Mr. Goodell should be the next to race Mr. Nelson, be on the lookout for future races. Make sure to donate funds to Trojans helping Trojans.