—Submitted photo The fort dodge half-marathon class ran in the DAM to DSM recently. Pictured before the race are, front row, left to right, Parker Gale and Caitlyn Uhlenhopp. Middle: Jolie Waldschmidt, Ella Johnson, Leah Myer, Dari Ortiz Colon, Vanesa Padilla-Arias and Ingris Marquez Urias. Back row: Rosmary Simancas Perez Simeon Roberts, Isaiah Grim, Grant Maxson and Myles Summers.

For a high school student, getting up at 5 a.m. isn’t an ideal morning.

When Simeon Roberts challenged himself to do it, though, the end reward was well worth the effort.

Roberts and 14 other Fort Dodge Senior High students took the half marathon class at school, where they trained for the DAM to DSM half-marathon that started at Saylorville Lake and ended in downtown Des Moines recently.

“Half marathon class was an amazing experience,” Roberts said. “A lot of people are turned off by the class since it’s at zero hour, which means it’s before school even starts sometimes at 5 a.m., but it’s honestly so worth it.

“I took the class as an opportunity and challenge to see how far I could push myself and see what I could achieve if I just stayed consistent — and I wanted six-pack abs before summer started.”

Teacher Nolan Johnson sees a variety of students enter the class for different reasons.

“I assume that the kids are coming in with no training,” Johnson said. “We start with timed runs and not mileage. The first week our longest run was 15 minutes. The goal was that three weeks from the race, we have an 11-mile run and taper the last week.

“The hardest part when it comes to high school kids is getting them to understand to run easier and getting your heart rate up and build.”

Thirteen of the Dodger students ran the 13.1-mile race in Des Moines last Saturday, fighting through the rain drops as all of them finished the event.

“It sounds cliche, but I’m so proud of all of the kids,” Johnson said. “Only one of the students has run that mileage before.

“Every one of these kids should know how proud of them I am for not having much running experience and being able to finish.”

The students were consistently reporting in the early-morning hours to get started and train.

“The workouts were pretty vigorous at times since I was doing it in the middle of my track season, but the feeling after completing a long run before some of your classmates even get out of bed is high-key one of the top-10 best feelings,” Roberts said.

For junior Ella Johnson, it was about being with friends and getting out of her comfort zone.

“The half marathon class was an opportunity to hang out with friends, improve my running, and step out of my comfort zone,” said Ella Johnson. “It was so rewarding crossing the finish line after putting in so much training and recovery from my knee injury.

“I didn’t even know if I could run the race when I first got injured because we didn’t know how bad it was. I went through physical therapy at Active Health and they were super helpful and made my experience amazing. Mr. Johnson was an amazing teacher. He made everything fun for us and was super understanding.”

With the race being the part of the final grade of the class, the consistent training was the most difficult part. Students had to find time to fit runs in and fight through injuries.

“I was so impressed with my class last year, and this class as a whole was great, showing up on time and doing the workouts,” said Mr. Johnson, who also ran in the marathon. “When you’re in high school, you’re juggling a lot, with the musical and everything else they have to do.

“They were completing the runs. I was impressed by the way they showed up.”

For Myles Summers, it was the second race that he has competed in.

“I have (completed) the half marathon class for two years now. My first year we went to Sioux Falls, South Dakota,” Summers said. “It’s a fun but hard experience. It takes a lot of work and training to be able to run these races. It also makes you question at times why you even chose to take the class to be honest.

“The training is hard and rearranging your schedule around it is difficult at times. But we get to have a fun trip with our classmates and then run a half marathon to be able to say that we ran a hard race in the end.”

This class wasn’t just about the half marathon and training, but also, dealing with adversity.

“It just shows the determination that the kids have,” Johnson said. “They faced injuries and battled through them while training for a half marathon. It meant a lot to watch these kids run and showed a lot about the people they are.

“It was a cool experience. It just goes to show that if they can handle this, they can deal with the rest of the stuff in front of them. It speaks volumes about them.”

There was also a social aspect to the race despite all of the hard work and focus.

“The race itself was so much fun,” Roberts said. “There was so much positivity and community throughout the whole entire race. I would have random runners come up to me and start conversations. There were people holding up funny banners My favorites were, ‘smile, you paid for this’ or ‘Pain is temporary, Strava is forever.’

“It’s hard to find a community like that, especially in sports. So just being surrounded by all of those amazing supportive runners made this unforgettable. I recommend everyone should at least experience a half marathon, and this is all coming from a guy whose signature saying was ‘to run is not to have fun.'”