second going to third

[eureka25]

Here is the sitch:

R1, no outs, 12 year-olds, OBR. R1 goes to steal second and Batter hits deep fly to right center. R1 gets to second base. R1 now "thinks" the ball is caught and takes 2 hard steps back towards first. Now realizing ball is not caught, he immediately goes to third without touching second. Defense gets the ball back into play.

These are the questions I have.
a) Does he need to re-acquire second again to go to third
b) Does "intent" of running back to 1st, make R1 have to re-acquire second.
c) What if ball was thrown out of play - did R1 own second base regardless of how far he ran back to first.

I know this goes back to a thread of running the bases in the wrong direction. This just has a little twist to it.

BTW - This was something I saw and no appeal was made - so nothing was done. Just had me thinking now it will happen again and want to be prepared.

Thanks,
Jeff

[mbyron]

a) Yes.
b) No, actually returning toward 1B requires R1 to touch 2B, intent is irrelevant.
c) No, he must touch 2B on the "last time by."

This is not running the bases in reverse order -- a legitimate return to 1B for a retouch is not a travesty of the game.