This weekend’s weather forecast -- a swirling nor’easter blowing up the East Coast, bringing lots of wind and rain -- comes at just the wrong time for local cross country runners. Saturday is the annual Bull Run at Hereford, the most anticipated meet of the season, drawing teams from over 100 schools.

Hereford’s grueling, hilly three-mile course is often run just fine in the rain, but I remember a few times when there was way too much rain to run and a few others when mud chewed up and spit out runners well short of their best times.

Then again, Hereford’s Kristen Malloy managed to set a course record in the rain in 2006.

A search through The Sun’s archives found the first mention of rain from reporter Paul McMullen, who wrote of "great rains in 1975," when the event was known as the Hereford Invitational.

More recently, it has rained on three of the last five Bull Runs, including 2003 when it was canceled after two attempts. Hurricane Isabel washed out the initial date. Officials tried to make up the meet a week later, but it rained again. After many JV runners slipped and fell in the mud during the first race, the rest of the event was canceled.

A year later, another hurricane struck on Bull Run weekend, but Ivan wasn’t so powerful. It slowed the course but the meet went on as usual.

Hereford coach Jason Bowman has raced the Bull Run’s Reunion Run in the rain, so he knows how challenging it can be, especially at its most infamous incline, The Dip, which runners must navigate twice -- 1¼ miles in and again about a half mile from the finish. The Sun’s freelancer Todd Karpovich once described The Dip as being so steep it could be a novice ski run.

"I remember people falling down and slip sliding away. I remember myself just sliding all over the place," Bowman said. "The obvious spot it gets you is in The Dip, but that first mile has a little valley that has you running on uneven terrain and that can be treacherous. The Dip is really treacherous, because there’s not a lot of grass there."

Fortunately, no Bull Run can match the awful conditions of what was likely the worst racing day ever on the Hereford course -- at the state championships in 1990.

That was November and it was cold and windy, not to mention the rain that just flowed down the hills.

Freelancer Bill Blewitt covered that state meet for The Sun and wrote "A steady, wind-blown rain produced conditions that one official described as the worst in 30 years. Scores of runners fell on the course and at least 15 were treated for hypothermia."

In the first race, Fallston’s Jenny Howard fell three times and was covered with mud as she crossed the finish line, but she still won her third state title. So did Centennial’s Pat Rodrigues, who managed to stay on his feet.

It certainly won’t be that bad on Saturday and here’s hoping that remembering all this will jinx the forecast and the sun will shine on the Bull Run.

-- Katherine Dunn