Chapter 296: Chapter 296: The Ox Loses Its Forehoof_1

“Dad, they’re catching up!” Although Tongtong was running and heard Li Niu’s roar, he still couldn’t help looking back and saw the two Lis sprinting wildly. He immediately turned to Xu Fan for help.

“What’s there to be afraid of, they won’t catch us!” Xu Fan confidently said.

Even though Li Xiaoniu had already picked up speed, the physical difference between Li Niu and Xu Fan was there, and it wasn’t something that could be solved by simply running faster.

“Dad! Let’s run faster, they’re about to reach the finish line!” Li Xiaoniu and his father, Li Niu, had covered about 7 meters of the track, but Xu Fan and Tongtong had already run over 8 meters and were less than two meters away from the finish line.

“Son! Let’s sprint!” Li Niu was also driven by a fierce fighting spirit at this moment. If he didn’t give it his all now, he probably would never catch up to Xu Fan.

Upon hearing his father’s command, Li Xiaoniu immediately began to take big strides.

He was half a head taller than Tongtong and naturally had longer legs. More importantly, Li Xiaoniu regularly exercised with Li Niu, so when he took strides, one of his steps was almost one and a half times that of Tongtong’s.

Li Niu’s thick arms were fully engaged in controlling Li Xiaoniu’s body. After all, it was already hard for Li Xiaoniu to maintain balance while walking on his father’s feet. If Li Xiaoniu tried to run on top of them, he almost had to rely completely on his father’s arms to prevent him from tumbling due to an unsteady center of gravity.

The two of them sprinted with large strides and indeed caught up to Xu Fan in an instant.

Although Tongtong didn’t have to worry about balance with the help of Xu Fan’s remote control, she was still a little girl with small and short steps. Li Xiaoniu, taking big strides, quickly stood shoulder to shoulder with Tongtong.

“This is bad, Dad, he’s going to overtake us,” Tongtong said hurriedly to Xu Fan.

Li Xiaoniu and Li Niu managing to catch up was a bit of a surprise to Xu Fan. However, once he saw Li Xiaoniu’s pace, a strange look flashed through his eyes.

With a “bang!”

Li Xiaoniu, out of eagerness, had run a bit too fast, and Xu Fan had already noticed that Li Xiaoniu’s next step was off the mark, no longer aligned with Li Niu’s foot.

As a result, Li Xiaoniu missed his step and slid right off of Li Niu’s foot.

With a bang, Li Xiaoniu hit the foam mat on the track.

Fortunately, the organizers had prepared the thick foam mats in advance, knowing the sport entailed a certain level of risk, so even though Li Xiaoniu fell on them, he wasn’t injured.

“Damn it! What the hell, kid, how could you slip like that!” Seeing Li Xiaoniu fall due to a mistake turned Li Niu’s face instantly dark.

At home, he normally played the role of a strict father, with very high expectations for Li Xiaoniu. Li Xiaoniu, who had always grown up under a harsh discipline, didn’t dare to talk back to Li Niu’s shouting and just said aggrieved from the ground, “Dad, I was wrong!”

“You fool, it’s such a waste to have educated you all these years; we’ll definitely lose face big time in this event!” Li Niu said sternly, severely chiding Li Xiaoniu.

Just then, Xu Fan and Tongtong’s team successfully reached the finish line, and with Tongtong’s cheers, they were the first to break the finish line ribbon.

“Oh yeah! Daddy, we are the champions!” Tongtong excitedly hopped off Xu Fan’s feet, and then, like a little monkey, climbed into Xu Fan’s arms.

“Haha, our Tongtong is awesome!” Xu Fan lifted Tongtong up and gently said.

By then, the timer on the field had already recorded the time it took for Xu Fan to cross the finish line, and he took the opportunity to remind Li Niu that he could still compete for a place if he wished, although he would have to start over from the beginning of the track because he had fallen off.

Since there were three events in total at the sports meet, even if one did not lose too badly in the first event, by relying on the points from the last two events, one could still win the final championship. Therefore, without much contemplation, Li Niu immediately picked up Li Xiaoniu from the ground.

“Get back on it, we haven’t lost yet, we still have a chance!”

“Right! The championship will definitely be ours!” Li Xiaoniu said undeterred and then got up from the ground and followed Li Niu, running at top speed back to the starting point of the track.

At this moment, the audience below erupted into enthusiastic applause at the sight of Xu Fan winning the championship and Li Niu’s falter, and plenty of people were mocking Li Niu.

However, Li Niu and Li Xiaoniu didn’t pay attention to the mockery from the crowd, still posed properly, and started their attempt on the track again.

This time, the two didn’t rashly underestimate their opponents. They stuck with the method that Li Niu had mastered from the beginning; their coordination was good, their pace not fast, but it was very stable as they moved forward.

The event had a time limit of three minutes, and if one could finish within those three minutes, the result would be valid, with points awarded based on the time it took to reach the finish line.

However, if after three minutes one had not reached the end, then sorry, that event would be considered incomplete and scored zero points.

Therefore, although Li Niu and Li Xiaoniu had fallen from the track, they were still far from the three-minute limit, so even starting over, they still had a chance to make it into the top few.

Even though their score for this event might be a few points lower than Xu Fan’s, as long as they outperformed Xu Fan in the following two events, there was still a chance to win the championship.

The coordination between Xu Fan and Tongtong just now was almost perfect; normally, it would take at least two minutes for anyone to complete the course without mishaps. Xu Fan and Tongtong had done it in just over 40 seconds.

Now, as the Li father and son duo had fallen near the finish line, they had lost forty seconds. However, if nothing unexpected happened, they would still be able to finish within three minutes.

On the track, the two were now in sync without the pressure of Xu Fan, their movements harmonious—step by step, not very fast, but very steady.

One minute later, Li Niu and his son’s team also successfully crossed the finish line.

“Dad, we are in second place!” Li Xiaoniu jumped three feet high; although they had not won the championship, they had at least gained the points for second place.

“Hmph, with only two teams participating, of course, we’re in second place. Don’t tell me the next team will surpass us. If we want to win the championship, we must not fail in the remaining two events, got it?” Li Niu frowned, speaking to Li Xiaoniu.

He was actually still upset about Li Xiaoniu falling earlier.

As an athlete, he only accepted success, not failure, no matter whether the person was his son or not.