Some of the best distance runners of the South came to Birmingham, Alabama, in 1941 to compete in the Southern Collegiate Conference meet. One of the events of the day was the two-mile run. It would be a grueling race, for the day was hot, and the eight quarter-mile laps seemed endless.

The runners took off at the sound of the gun, and settled down for the long run. Then one of the runners took the lead. Spectators and officials checked their records. That boy wasn’t supposed to be in the race at all.

Referee C. W. Streit thought he recognized the runner. It was Walter Spain, a boy from a nearby high school. Moving onto the track, the referee tried to grab Spain’s arm as he went by, but the youngster dodged and kept on running.

On the next lap a group of policemen were waiting for Spain and they forced him to the sidelines. Referee Streit began to give Spain a stern lecture. But suddenly the young runner broke away, and the crowd was up and roaring. Spain wasn’t running from the police; he wanted to get back into the race. The police started to chase him again, but Streit called out, “No, let him run. If he wants to race that badly, leave him alone.”

Spain had lost half a lap because of the police, but he sprinted madly after the pack. Soon he was even with the last runner, and then moved by. Pounding into the home stretch Spain kept passing the runners, as the crowd cheered him on. He reached fourth position, but that was as far as the high school runner could go. He dropped back to fifth, and that was where he finished–unofficially.

As a rule, golf tournaments are not played in the rain. But one year, during the Southern California Women’s Open, the golfers were caught in a downpour. Mary K. Brown was drenched as she tried to putt out on the last hole. But the cup was full of water. The ball rolled across the water and kept going, over the cup and down the hill, caught in a little rivulet of water. Luckily the officials saw what happened. When the rain stopped they let her take the stroke over.

From Strange But True Sports Stories by Howard Liss. Illustrations by Joe Mathieu.