Crosby's former coach share details on one of his infamous stunts.

When you think of Sidney Crosby the first thing that will probably come to your mind is the fact that he is captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins. If that isn't it though it will probably be something like National Hockey League superstar, gold medal winner or perhaps multi time Stanley Cup Champion, I'm sure you're starting to see a pattern here. Crosby has been incredibly successful in his career and for that reason it will be hard for some fans to imagine Crosby as a shy and even unconfident young boy, but like many of us growing up he was exactly that.

Recently a number of Crosby's former teammates, coaches and teachers shared their stories about Crosby's time at Shattuck-St. Mary’s, a prep school in Faribault, Minnesota but there was one story in particular that stood out to me. According to several different people Crosby, in spite of the fact that he would go on to be among the greatest players to ever lace up skates in the NHL, was very concerned about a particular test he would face as part of his time at the school and did everything in his power to make sure he wouldn't fail.

"One of the things we did during tryouts was to run a timed mile," said Coach Soltys as per The Athletic. "The kids had to come in under (six minutes). The story goes that the night before that, Sid and Ryan Duncan, his roommate, were nervous about what their time would be."

Well the ultra competitive Sidney Crosby was not going to let that happen was he? According to one teammate he and the aforementioned roomate orchestrated a rather unbelievable plan to get out to the track the night before and do a test run of their own.

"They pulled the old tie-the-bedsheet-together trick to sneak out of their third-story window after curfew," said Coach Soltys. "And they timed themselves running this test. Here’s Sidney Crosby, the best player in the world, and Ryan Duncan, a Hobey Baker winner. And they are nervous about potentially not making the club if they fail this off-ice mile test. I got the biggest howl about that."

It does seem rather ridiculous given what we know now, but it is a testament to the fact that Crosby's competitiveness has been driving him forward since the very beginning.