Stepping Down as CHS Coach

It is with sincere sadness that I am telling everyone that I am stepping down as a coach at Chaparral HS. I met with Coach Bowman this morning, and I told him that I simply cannot coach to the level that I think the position demands. I want to see my family more, I want to be able to dedicate more to my science teaching, and I want to be able to pursue some personal goals I have. I feel coaching is a service to the athletes, and if a coach cannot dedicate themselves fully and give the best service possible, than that opportunity should be given to someone else. I am sure Coach Bowman and the administration at Chaparral will find a coach who is ten times better than me, and that is a good thing. The athletes who commit themselves to distance track deserve only the best.

I thought about coaching in a reduced role, whether it was as a JV developmental coach, or dropping down to 2 days a week, or only going to half of the meets, and I realized it just wouldn't work for a couple of reasons. One, distance kids need a full time coach, it is just the nature of distance running.  Two, I could never do something only halfway. Over the years, I have turned head/distance coaching into a seven day a week affair. Even on Sundays, I would spend 3 hours crunching training numbers, prepping for the upcoming week, working on administrative stuff. I am no different from the head coaches at Castle Rock or ThunderRidge, or anywhere else, it is what it is. But, it just got to be too much for me to be able to handle. If I was single with no kids, it would be a different story. To be honest though, at this phase of my life, I would rather be out on the ski trails with Chloe than sitting in front of a computer screen trying to make sure the Wednesday interval sessions would be absolutely perfect. As I said before, I truly feel if I cannot offer that level of dedication and commitment to a group of dedicated and committed athletes, than I should not be the coach.

I want to say thanks to all of the coaches I have worked with over the years, everyone has taught me so much. Mr. Thompson, thanks for supporting me and having my back all these years. Coach Hawk, thanks for giving an unknown smartass a chance ten years ago to coach at a bigtime 5A school. Coach Thomas, thanks for giving me a whole new perspective on how to coach kids. Coach Bowman, thanks for turning this program into the powerhouse it is today. Thanks Coach Boymel, for bringing so many new ideas to my brain. Thanks Coach Maroney, for being not only one of my best friends, but the one guy I trust explicitly with everything I do. Mrs. Whipple, thanks for helping me with anything and everything under the sun. You made my life infinitely easier, and I am eternally grateful for that. Coach Laster, thanks for simply being the best distance coach out there. We did a lot together my friend, maybe someday in the future we can do it all again. And thanks to the incredible coaching staff I have gotten to work with the past few years. Harris, Able, Lib, Hartman, Bowman, Hawk, and Maroney, that is the best coaching staff in CHS T&F history, hands down. Everyone had each other's backs and everyone made sure the athlete was put first. Just an awesome staff that I am so sad to leave.  I can honestly say that every coach I worked with was an excellent coach, and it was an honor to stand next to them on Saturdays.

Of course, I also want to thank all of the athletes who I have gotten the chance to train. From the seniors way back in 2003 to the super fast freshman class this past spring, it has been a dream come true to be able to work with all of you, and the experience of the past ten years has made me into such a better person. It is winning I will miss the most, not just winning state titles though. When you guys would win any race, whether it was varsity, JV or time trial; when you would set new PR's; when you would qualify for State; when you would slingshot someone to get them at the line; when you would do that one extra interval on a Monday practice; when you would come back to the high school in the dark because you just did your longest overdistance run of the year, that is "winning". Going above and beyond what you thought possible, being a part of that and witnessing that; that is what I will miss the most. It's cliche, but I hope I taught you all that losing is simply not an option. If you play, you must strive to win. You won't win every time, for sure, but when you do win, it is the best feeling in the world. It makes all the hard work and sacrifice worth it. Thanks for giving me those thrills everyone, I treasure those feeling and memories so so much.

I am sad to leave, but I know this is for the best for everyone involved. I wish everyone reading this a successful cross country season, and an even better spring track season. Stay in touch, I will still be coaching the little kids back at Sierra, so if you are ever in the neighborhood, come on by and say "hi".

Thanks.

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End of Season Wrap Up

It has been 167 blog postings since we started this whole track season thing way back at the beginning of October. I think we had a very successful season, but man, what a long strange trip it's been.  From shoveling the track to flying to Florida, from getting hailed out at League Champs to running up Green Mtn., from indoor meets in Boulder to twilight meets in Pueblo, from pre-dawn 500m repeats to "suns out, guns out" 60F+ days; this season has been a wonderful journey for me. The effort matters more than any of the results, and I can say without hesitation that the work put in by everybody involved with this program was second-to-none.  For that, I can look back on this year and be proud. Be proud of all the work the athletes and coaches put in, and be proud that we did everything we could to make ourselves the best runners we could be. Unless you take risks in life, you are never truly alive. I feel that this program did everything possible to become better racers, and I have no regrets at all looking back.

I meet a lot of coaches over the season, some good ones, some not so good ones. I sometimes wonder how these other coaches would fit in on our staff. It is not with false modesty that I say I would rather have our coaches over anyone else in the state. I think we have the best coaching staff in Colorado, I think that this coaching staff gets the best out of every single athlete, and I am eternally grateful to all of them for all the hard work and time they put into this program. Without Lib, Tessa, Abes, Hawk, Harris, Bowman and Jimmy, CHS T&F would be a dumpster fire, so huge thanks and gratitude go out to them.

I wish a fond farewell to all of the seniors who have been the backbone of the program for the last four years. This was an excellent group of kids to work with, and I know they will be doing some pretty impressive things, both on and off the track, in the coming years. I sincerely hope they keep in touch, if nothing more than for them to whip me in some mountain trail races.   Remember, a boomerang that doesn't come back is just a stick, as they say. I am also very excited for our underclassmen in the coming years. We have some great young talent on this team, and even though we are losing a lot to graduation, I think we will still be very strong next year. Maybe even stronger than this year.

Wow that three day State Meet is a grind, isn't it? It started for Coach Bowman & I on Wednesday night, and we loaded up the truck to fight traffic home Saturday around 6:00. In-between was a up and down meet, but overall I was very pleased with the effort and results.  I think there are some things we can do better next year to perform at this meet, and I think we did some things very well. No regrets, no complaints from me, and Jimmy likes to say, it is a process. I think our growth as a team and the path we are continuing down is a very positive one.

It is a tough job keeping up with all of the results from four events all year, but I don't think anything slipped through the cracks. As much as I try to stress that your effort matters more than your results, track is a numbers based sport. That is how we determine who is better than someone else. I believe if you posted our season bests against any other teams seasons bests, there is a pretty good chance we would come out on top. The men and the women both had great results from top to bottom this year, and that is due 100% to all the hard work these athletes put in over the course of seven months. Everyone on these lists should be very proud of themselves. I have also updated the Top 9 list. We have a lot of "2013" that crept onto that list this year, which is really fantastic.

Now summer training begins. I strongly suggest to everyone reading this blog to run cross country at the high school level. Running XC gives all track athletes a great base on which to build winter intervals on. Even if you don't see yourself as a 5km runner, "suffering" through XC can make you a much stronger track star, especially in the month of May. A couple years ago, I put together a restaurant style menu of workouts for your summer training. It is a choice based program, one that you must be very self motivated to stick with. This program is designed to get you stronger and ready to race in the fall, not for winning the Georgetown Half Marathon in August. Check it out, use what you want from it, but most of all, stick with it. Results will not appear overnight, it will only be when school starts up again that you notice how much faster and stronger you are.

This week, Coach Bowman and I will start the mundane end-of-year tasks of cleaning out the cube and the cage. If you still have your uniform or your windsuit, please do to the schoolhouse and return those to Bowman as soon as possible. As in, on Monday. Put your clean uniform and windsuit in a plastic shopping bag, make sure your name and grade are clearly written on the bag, and personally deliver it to Coach Bowman. Those $90 uniforms and $140 windsuits are needed for next year, so please return them back to the program. Rocking your high school track uniform on your new college campus makes you a real loser, as we all know. We will also need some help this week, putting away the pole vault pits, storing the high jump pits, organizing the hurdles, and generally cleaning out the cube. We will let the underclassmen know when we are doing this, and the coaches could really use some help that day. Thanks in advance for that one.

My plans for the summer? Unplug from the track scene and decompress for a couple weeks. I suggest all the athletes do that as well. The Seppala family will be taking some trips this summer. back east for a couple weeks, up to the mountains as much as possible. I want to get in a good summer of running with Chloe and Reid as well, and I still gotta get those sprinklers going. Even though I will be traveling a lot, keep in touch. I would love to go on some trail runs with anyone, and maybe we can sneak in a Red Rocks stairs session. Just let me know, and we can try to connect.

Finally, a sincere thanks to everyone that helped make this program as successful as it has become. We are a presence now in the track community, other teams know that when Chaparral shows up, they are in for a fight. Everyone from administration to the trainers, from all of the awesome supportive parents to all of the generous people in the business community, all of the athletes and all of the coaches; everyone contributes mightily to the success of this team. I sincerely thank everyone who is on our side, we couldn't do it without you. Thanks.

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Letter of Thanks

Mr Stairs emailed me last night, he was so happy with all the hard work the CHAP athletes put into the middle school meets the past couple of days. Read below.

Chaparral Track Team, 

Thank you for coming out and supporting Sierra's track program!  It was great to see several of you promoting track and field and sharing your knowledge with our athletes.  They certainly look up to you all as role models. Thank you for your tremendous help in timing, running the jumps, and cleaning up after the meet. Keep us in mind next year.  We will need the help again.  Good luck to you all at state this weekend!  Go Chap!!!

Sincerely,

Chris Stairs

SMS Athletic Director

This is the kind of stuff that is super important. Giving back to the track and field community is a big deal, and representing Chaparral in this positive light is even bigger. The middle school championships are on Friday at 3:15 at the stadium in Parker. If anyone (athlete or adult) wants to help out there, just shoot Mr. Stairs an email, he would love to have the help. Great job by everyone!

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Happy Birthday Chloe!

This tweet brought back some happy memories of today.

 

Alex B‏@BigAssBals

@ColoradoSep tell Chloe happy birthday from me! I hope you guys have a nice day #ChloesBirthday #StateChampsDay

Quite a haul

It was four years ago today that my lovely daughter Chloe was born. We had chocolate chip pancakes and opened presents this morning.  It was the perfect way to start they day. Happy birthday, Clo, I love you!

It was also this day four years ago that Alex, Taylor, Nate and Johnny won a state title in the 4x800. I was lucky enough to get there about 20 minutes before the race started. I had been up all night with Beth (who was the real MVP of that day), and I will never forget seeing Coach Jared Neale before the race. He immediately hugged me and congratulated me on Chloe's birth (everyone knew where I was) and I replied, "We haven't won anything yet!" Ugh. What was I thinking??

Anyways, I can only hope for half of as successful day this week.  If all our guys run their best races, we got a shot. And I truly believe they got that in them. So does the birthday girl.

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State Championship Schedule

I wish I could be as fancy as Coach Whitenack with his embedded pdf files, but I gotta go old school on this post. Just typing it all out by hand, but I think I will get the information across.

The meet is being held up at Jefferson Country Stadium. This is located at 6th Ave and Kipling.  It is about 30 minutes away from Chaparral HS with no traffic. However, on I-25, there is no such thing as no traffic, so please give yourself plenty of time to get there, at least an hour, in my estimation.

We will have set up our camp in the SE corner of the complex, inside the fence. When you arrive, call me to gt your athlete pass. Please try to arrive as a group so we can give you the athlete passes all at once. Nothing is more frustrating for a coach to have to keep running back to the NE entrance to deliver passes to get in on the day of a big meet.

The meet is spread over three days. The first day is Thursday, and we have:

Pole Jump - 8:30 am - Nolan
100m Prelims - 8:50 - Alek - Heat 1
3200m Finals - 9:10 - Dominic
400m Prelims - 11:00 - Alek - Heat 2
Discus Finals - 11:00 - Jenny - Flight 2
4x800m Finals - 11:35 - James, Johnny, Ryan, Devin (Dom & Trav)
200m Prelims - 12:50 - Alek - Heat 3 (tie for 18th, three heats total)

Friday's schedule:
4x100 Prelims - 9:30 am - Katrina, Jenna, Katie & Olivia - Heat 2 / Austin, Spencer, Drew & Javon - heat 2
High Jump - 10:30 - Katrina
300H Prelims - 10:55 - Jenna - Heat 1
800m Finals - 12:50 - Devin
4x400 Prelims - 4:10 - Dane, Ryan, Devin, Alek (Johnny & Drew) - Heat 1

Saturday's schedule:
100m Finals - 10:30 - Alek?
400m Finals - 11:30 - Alek?
200m Finals - 1:40 - Alek?
300H Finals - 2:00 - Jenna?
4x100 Finals - 3:35 - Katrina, Jenna, Katie & Olivia? / Austin, Spencer, Drew & Javon
1600m Finals - 4:00 - James & Dominic
4x400 Finals - 5:10 - Dane, Ryan, Devin, Alek (Johnny & Drew)?

When you look at it this way, we got a lot of kids going to State, which is pretty awesome. I can say I achieved 1/2 of my goal. We got boys in all the track events (100/200/400/800/1600/3200) plus 3/4 of the relays (4x1/4x4/4x8), now we just gotta get some girls running in these events. Next year for sure we will get some in, I am confident of that.

Easy day at practice today, psych up day tomorrow, race like the wind on Thursday. I can't wait!

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League Championship Thanks

I would remiss if I did not give a huge shout out to all of the people who helped us host the League Championship meet this past weekend. It turned into a three day affair, with the weather wiping out all of the prep work that we did Thursday morning. However, with the help of everyone, we pulled off a great prelim meet on Friday afternoon, and an excellent championship round on Saturday.

With out the help of everyone in the hip number garage, the volunteers out on the field lining up the athletes for heats, the folks who ran the concession stands, the people in the press box, the coaches running the field events, the race timers at the finish line, the JV athletes who ran stairs all day with results, the teachers who sold tickets at the gate, and of course, everyone who helped clean up afterwards; the meet would have been a disaster. We pride ourselves on how efficiently we run a meet, and this weekend was a great example of that.

So, without naming each and every peson who helped (as I know I would leave out someone), I say "THANK YOU" from the bottom of my heart. I am very, very appreciative.

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League Championship Thoughts

-Coming in second by 1/2 of a point on the men's side is a bitter pill to swallow, even after many hours of ruminating on it. But, there is no disputing that the results we posted were excellent. Three weeks ago, after Liberty Bell, if someone had told me we would come in second at League, I would have been ecstatic. Today's results make me very proud of all the hard work the athletes have put in.

-The women, who came in 7th out of twelve teams in our super competitive league should be proud of themselves as well. They worked just as hard as the men, and they had a great showing up these championships as well.

-We had mucho league champions, which gets your picture up on the wall in the building after you graduate. Girls 4 x 1, Boys 4 x 8, Girls High Jump, Boys Two Mile, Boys 400 and Boys 800. That's pretty impressive. I am very proud of that.

-This is over, and now we get to prepare for State Championships. CHSAA will release the heat sheets later on this afternoon, but right now we are looking at quite a few people practicing this week. Practice is closed to only State Meet participants this week, as we need to really be able to focus and prepare for this meet.  Line-ups and schedule will be forthcoming later today, but right now, I really gotta get some sleep.

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League Champs Heat Sheets

The heat sheets for Cont. League Champs are out. I have gone through and highlighted each CHAP entry.

Click on the link below to get a closer look at them.

The biggest thing I get from heat sheets is not the competition, but rather how much time/how many heats we have before our events so we can time our warm-up correctly.

Continental League Heat Sheets

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Community Service, Sierra MS & JV Athletes

On May 13th and May 14th, Sierra MS is hosting two middle school track meets. They will be at Sierra track, after school, and they usually get done at 6:30. I am hoping there are some JV athletes who are finished for the season who would be willing to help out at their old alma mater.

The Sierra track coaches need help with field events, timing and general track meet management. They are also willing to sign off on community service hours, which is a graduation requirement at CHS.

This is a great way to give back to the local track & field community, help out the next generation of track & field athletes, and get some of that community service out of the way. Please let me know if you can help, and I will forward that onto the Sierra coaches.

Thanks!

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League Championship Entries

Below are the League Championship Line-ups for Chaparral Track & Field.

2013 Cont. League CHS T&F Entries

As usual, show up 90 minutes before your first race, give yourself plenty of time to warm up and compete well!

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Updated Season Bests (5/6/13)

Female

Male

Just for transparencies sake, here are the distance kids season bests up to this point. I try and fill out the League Championship line-ups based on who is running fastest right now  but I also take into account seniors, and who ran at JV championships. Hopefully I can get line-ups for this championship race out early tomorrow morning. But for now, enjoy your new season bests! Looks like a lot of kids were running the fastest at the end of the season, which is really great news!

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Dave Sonka

Cpl. David Sonka

Dave Sonka was a former student and classmate of mine. He was killed in action serving our country this weekend in Afghanistan.

While I feel pretty numb right now, I can tell you this. Dave was a smart kid, a hard working competitive runner with a great sense of wit and humor. I remember all the shenanigans he and his cronies (Ethan, Jack, etc) would all get into; going on long runs with him on the Cherry Creek trail, before the new bridge was put in; Dave racing his brains out at JV meets. I remember him being a great representative of what Chaparral stood for.

I am very honored to say that this brave man was a Wolverine runner. I thank him for serving our country, and hope his family finds some solace knowing he died defending our freedoms.

Thanks Sonka,

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League Champs Schedule

Below is the official League Championships schedule for this weekend.

Line-ups will be posted Tuesday night.

The meet will be held at the big stadium down in Parker.

If the weather is poor on Thursday, we will move Thursdays events to Friday.

We will not run ahead of schedule, to ensure proper rest for the athletes.

All events are finals on Saturday. Multiple heats for relays and distance events, one single heat for an events that had prelims on Thursday.

As I mentioned at the BBQ on Saturday, we needs as much help as we can get formt eh CHS T&F family and friends  If you can help out on those two days in any way, that would be much appreciated. We pride ourselves on running a smooth efficient event, and that is all due to the volunteers we get helping us out.

Please shoot me an email, bseppala19[at]gmail[dot]com , and I can communicate with you on what we need.

Thanks so much, and hope to see lots of folks out supporting us this weekend. This is what we have been working all winter towards, time to step it up!

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State Rankings - 5/5/13

May 5th Rankings

Here are the up-to-date state rankings leading into League Championships.

This will help coaches set the line-ups for League Champs, as we have two goals. Win the League title as well as put kids in the best spot to get one last chance to qualify for State.

League Champs Schedule coming soon.

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Updated Pueblo Schedule

This is the latest information from the meet director. Please read carefully, there are a few small, but important changes.

12:30 – Coaches Meeting, south end of track - I know a few of you are coming for distance events only. The main thing you need to know is the schedule below. We won't start 1600s before 7 PM. Arrive in plenty of time for kids to warm up, however.

Afternoon Session - boys heats will precede girls heats to provide some space between SMR8s and girls 100s

1:00 - SMR8 (girls only)

1:15 - 100s

1:50 - 100H/110H

2:30 - 4x200

2:50 - 800 (three heats per gender)

3:20 - 4x100

3:40 - 400

4:15 - 300H

4:50 - 4x800 (two heats boys, one heat girls)

5:35 - 200

6:00 - Break (time to visit concessions, buffer if afternoon events run a little late)

Evening Session - we may move through this session slightly ahead of schedule, time schedule given is an approximation. We will do introductions of top heat for each gender for both 1600s and 3200s

7:00 - 1600

     Girls Heat 1

     Boys Heat 1

     Girls Heat 2

     Boys Heat 2

     Girls Heat 3

     Boys Heat 3

8:00 - 4x400 (2 heats per gender, girls heats first, then boys heats)

8:25 - 3200 

     Girls Heat 1

     Boys Heat 1

     Girls Heat 2

     Boys Heat 2

Field Events:

1 PM Start - Boys PV, TJ, SP, Girls DT, LJ, HJ

3:45 PM Start - Boys DT, LJ, HJ, Girls PV, TJ, SP

There will be a parking fee for close-in parking for anyone except school vehicles and coaches. Try to let your parents know.

I have one other request. I know there are a lot of parents coming down to watch the meet. If those parents could help the team out by bringing some healthy snacks, that would be really awesome. Each parent does not have to feed the entire squad, but if each CHS car could snag one bag of tangerines, or one box of granola bars, or one canister of powdered gatorade, etc, etc. that would be really huge. When you get here, you can just drop it off at camp, or with a coach. I do not know this stadium lay-out at all, so I do not know where our team camp will be, but we will make sure the athletes get all the nutritious, full-of-energy food you bring. Parents might not be able to be in the camp with the kids, and that's OK, but any help you can give us in that area would be great!

Thanks,

SEP

P.S. Sorry about the big white formatting block. I am working on this from my phone, and the copy/paste feature is making some background mistakes. I hope it still readable and clear.

Pueblo Goals

It's that time of the year where I have my student aid create these charts. (I'm not smart enough to do it myself.) Using MaxPreps.com, she figured the out the 18th place in 5A as well as 8th place in the Cont. League as of right now, May 1st.

These need to be our goals for the meet this Friday. We need to be either shooting for top 18 in the State, or top 8 in our League. The closer we get to those numbers in every event we compete in, the better off we will be for the next two weeks!

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Freshman/Sophomore Championships

This Thursday, up at Regis HS, at 3:00 is the Freshman-Sophomore Championships. This meet has turned into a pretty prestigious meet, with state qualification riding on the line. Whereas before it was a meet that we just filled up sparsely  now we are stacking it with kids in hopes to get them a time that would qualify them for the State meet. There is no distinction between varsity and JV, we are putting our best freshman and sophomores out there to get them race experience.

It really is a lovely run.

CHS T&F FR/SP Line-Ups

The FR/SP meet starts at 3:00, rolling schedule. No bus home, so make sure you have aride home from Regis. (Although the Cherry Creek Trail is nearby, so you can always run home. It's not that bad of a jog, I think I have done it once or twice in my younger years.)

The bus leaves CHS at 1:30. This is a little earlier than we would like, but we have no choice. I strongly recommend athletes to bring some school work to do while we wait for the meet to begin. I know I will be plowing through some grading while I sit there.

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Pueblo Twilight Information

The entries for the Pueblo Twilight meet are now posted over on www.milesplit.com, and from first glance, it looks like we qualified everyone we entered.

Pueblo Twilight Acceptance Lists

Here is the entry sheet that I submitted, like I said, at first glance, it looks like we got everyone in.  I will look more closely later today, but I am very proud we are representing so well at this meet.  So are the other coaches, just got this email from Coach Lib:

I was just looking at the accepted Pueblo entries and I am pretty fired up for this one, I think we will represent pretty well. Looks like a good meet. Coach Lib

2013 Pueble Twilight CHS Line-Ups

The bus will be leaving from the school at 10:15 or so. It is about a 100 mile drive, and takes about 90 minutes or so. We are competing at the newly revamped CSU Pueblo ThunderBowl Stadium, which is going to be awesome. The weather looks to be pretty conducive to some good performances, looking like a high in the upper 60's and low winds (knock on wood). This is an all day event for the athletes, so everyone must have at least two bottles of water, plenty of snacks, a good healthy lunch, and probably some extra cash as well.

There is no bus back form Pueblo, as most of the athletes going informed us that they could get rides back to Parker that night. If you are entered into this meet, and you are unsure of how you are getting home, you must tell Coach Bowman or I immediately.  We can get you home, but the sooner we know the better. We do not want this to be a deterrent to you attending the meet.

This is a meet I have been looking forward to all year. We are resting up this week, in hopes that we can really lay down some fast times. Next week is League Champs, so I think this meet will show us where we really stand. Let's start thinking positively about our running, and go into this meet on a big fast wave!

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JV Championship Results

Wow. That meet was one we will not soon forget. Everyone who was there knows what I am talking about. But, even though that was the slowest run meet I have been to in a long time, the weather held up remarkably well, and we had 36 (thirty-six!) new season bests on the distance side! That is unheard of, everyone was running so fat, faster than they had ever done before, and I am so proud of all of them.

Here they are, in no particular order.

Landon (55.7), Darin (60.7), Austin (62.1), Britney (69.7), Gavin (59.0), Patrick (65.1), and Mark (60.8) all got new best times in the 400.

Gavin (2:15.4), James (2:26.3), Chelsey (2:57.5), Emily (3:27.9), Kelly (3:28.5), Ellen (2:43.7), Cory (2:35.8), Spencer (2:40.3), Art (2:45.6), Johnny (2:52.5), Zack (2:57.1) and Darin (2:24.4) all got new best times in the 800.

Emily (7:16.1), Kelly (7:21.0), Taylor (6:27.7), Ashley (6:21.9), Ellen (6:15.2), Kat (6:19.1, Mariah (6:12.1), Landon (5:02.5), Austin (5:03.9), Cory (5:32.4), Spencer (5:38.4), Alex (5:23.2), Zack (6:27.6) Art (5:57.9) and Johnny (6:03.3) all had new best times in the 1600.

Finally, Jack (12:02.7) and James (11:55.9) had new best times in the 3200.

While the meet was not scored for teams, I am very confident that we came out on top. It was a great day for running fast, and I am very proud of everyone. Excellent work, ladies and gentlemen.

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JV Championships

2013 JV Championships Line-Ups

Here are the line-ups for the JV Championships. This meet will be after school on Thursday at Highlands Ranch HS. Hope to see a lot of first place finishes, I think we have a pretty good team this year!

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Liberty Bell Line-Ups

2013 Liberty Bell Line Ups

Due to some AP testing in the morning, as well as two entries per open event, we have some normal varsity kids not racing at this meet. However, we hope all of you come over to Littleton HS anyways to cheer on and support your teammates.

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Looking Back and Looking Forward

The start of championship season

-Great performances by the team this weekend. 2nd for the girls at the Rock Canyon Invite, 3rd for the boys. With a few exceptions, this was essentially a league championship meet, and I am very proud of both squads. We had a table full of medals and ribbons to give away on Monday, that is always a good thing.

-We had quite a few kids reach new season bests this weekend. Over at Dakota Ridge, Dom got a new best in the two mile, and James did in the mile (9:45 and 4:29). I know Matty got a new best in the two mile, and in the mile, so did Steven, Whitney Erika, and Ciara. Caleb got a new best in the 800, as well as Jill & Ellen. And there were a slew of new bests in the 400, lead by Alek going sub 50 in the open
race. Wow!

-This week is a pretty crazy week. For some, it will be the last week of racing. For others, it is the springboard to the State Meet.  On Thursday, at Highlands Ranch HS, we have the JV Championship. Same rules as usual for the transportation. We will have a bus to Highlands Ranch, but not one back.  Dismissal at 2:05, bus leaves at 2:15 sharp. We will be running lots of kids here, I think we have a good chance to win the overall trophy.

-On Friday afternoon/evening and all day Saturday, we have the Varsity Liberty Bell Invite at Littleton High School. This is the biggest invitational of the year, and it only allows two entries per open event. This is a big time meet, I am hoping we run well there. For Friday prelims and elite 3200, there will be no bus. For Saturday, all participants will ride the bus to Littleton and it will leave CHS at 8:15 am.  This is our first real bus ride of the year, I am looking forward to it! There will be no bus back, so you must arrange a ride home when you are done.

-Because of weird rules that disallow JV Champ kids from participating in Var. League Champs, and because Lib Bell only allows two entries, there will be some kids who are not racing this weekend. There really is nothing we can do about this. We cannot risk running those third and fourth event ranked kids at JV Champs, as we will need them eligible for Var Champs. All we can say is, you get a day off to rest and recover for the upcoming weeks!

-The following week, we have Freshman/Sophomore Championships at Regis HS on Thursday. This is a state qualification meet, so we will be running the best freshman and sophomores we have, regardless of JV/V status. Same thing as JV Champs, dismissal at 2:05, bis leaves at 2:15, no bus back from Regis.

-Friday we are heading down to Pueblo all day for the Pueblo Twilight meet. This is an elite meet,  with strict qualifying standards, and it's really our last chance to run some state qualifying times. We have been preparing all year for this meet, so I hope we will be at our best. Participants will be dismissed from school at 10:15 am for the meet and are responsible for any missed schoolwork. We are still trying to figure out if we will need a bus to come back, that will be discussed today at practice.

-Finally, the Saturday afternoon after the Pueblo Meet, we will be holding our annual pep rally BBQ banquet at Chaparral. More details will be forthcoming, but it is a low key, burgers and dogs, pep rally to get kids psyched up for League Championships. We will be handing out team awards and senior gifts, playing some games, and generally having a good time reflecting on the season so far and the season to come.  We will certainly need some help from parents pulling this off, but I hope everyone and their families can make it out, it is a really fun time.

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CHS Top 30 (Third Week of April)

Coach Whitneack sent me his template for the top 30 in the State. I modified it to fit the best marks that CHS has. This is a fluid document, I hope it changes for the better in the upcoming weeks. Gives you some marks to shoot for, certainly  but also shows that we are well on our way to having a bust weekend at State!

Competition Pictures

We have so many awesome people that take pictures at our meets. I want to give some of them a shout out on the blog.

Kevin Keyser came and took a ton of pictures at our meet Saturday. Go to his website to check them out. I hear there is a good one of Chloe and Reid somewhere. Future track stars I hope.

Mrs. Young (Zach's mom) is at every meet taking lots of pictures as well. She has a link on the side, so you can go to her shutterfly site and check those out as well.

Finally, Mrs. Jenkins (Evan's mom) has been at all the JV meet taking tons of great shots. I have posted a few of them below, but I have tons more on CD's at home. You can email me or email Mrs. Jenkins and we can hook you up with them.

I am so grateful that we have all of this support at our meets, it is fantastic, and thanks go out to everyone who supports us.

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April 22 Weekly Distance Schedule

Easy week this week, but we have three days of racing.

Monday - Varied Tempo Intervals & Off-Road Repeats
Tuesday - OverDistance Run (90+ min)
Wednesday - Roll of the Dice & Hand-Off Practice
Thursday - JV Divisional Championships
Thursday - Easy Stonegate Run
Friday - Liberty Bell Prelims/Strides @ LHS (No JV Practice)
Saturday - Liberty Bell Invite @ LHS
Sunday - Beth's Birthday

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Last Day of Ski Season

I got first tracks on the last day of ski season this morning, and I has almost the only one out there. This guy joined me for a few minutes.

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Ryan Whitenack's State Qualification Analysis

Why re-invent the wheel?

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Rock Canyon Varsity Line-Ups

Here are the finalized RCHS Invite varsity line-ups. Refer to the schedule in the previous post for exact event starting times. See you all Friday afternoon for a tune-up practice.

And here is a picture of Chloe watching Reid eat his first birthday cake last week at his party.

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Real Quick Points

Loveland is canceled for this weekend. Actually postponed to Wednesday, but we will not be attending.

We will be at the Rock Canyon invite, at Parker Stadium.  It is a varsity only meet, so unfortunately, the JV kids do not get to compete this week. That sucks.

Here is the schedule for the meet on Saturday.

2013 Rock Canyon Invite Schedule

Athletes are expected to be at the meet at least 90 minutes before their race. The earlier the better.

Our entries will be posted later tonight. We are still finalizing them.

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Loveland (R2-J) Invite Line-Ups

This is going to be a really fun meet.  Look at all of the exceptional athletes we are bringing up there. I am really excited for this meet. Not sure whether it is going to be Friday or Saturday just yet, so keep your calendars open. AS soon as I find out, I will let everyone know when we are heading up to Loveland HS. We cannot have anyone cancel out on us from this point forward. If you cannot go, that probably screws up a relay as well as an open event. You must be the best teammate you can be, you must show up and race as hard as you can this weekend.

We will not be having a bus back, it is too expensive. You must arrange for a ride home with one of your friends parents. If this is an issue for you, you must speak to a coach about it immediately and they will help you out with the situation. While you do not have to stay for the entire meet, we encourage you to, to help cheer your teammates on.

Your race day diet is super important as well. You should be bringing a cooler filled with healthy easily digestible food (and plenty of water) with you to this meet. We have some kids competing in four events, spread out all day long. You must eat well and stay hydrated throughout the day.  For more tips on eating, click back to the post I wrote about a year ago on it.

EATING

Congratulations to everyone on this list, I am so proud to be bringing such a strong and deep team up to this meet. We won the boys title last year, let's try and do it again on both sides this time!

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Boston

Today is a holiday in Boston. It's Patriots Day. No one is in school. Banks and post offices are closed. A state holiday. Everyone is out watching the marathon, or home having lunch with the family, or day drinking at the Sox game.  You'd take your kid to the park, cause from the looks of it, it is a perfect spring New England day. The best place in the world to be on a great spring day is Boston, hands down.

That's why these bombs that blew up on Bolyston are so scary. I am not going to post any pictures or any video here, but this is horrible, horrible stuff. People died today, just thinking they were going to watch a race. And this didn't occur during the elites. They were long gone. This happened when all the husbands and wives were watching their spouses finally achieve a huge goal of training for and completing a marathon.  The people who are lucky to break four hours, the ones who have to walk and were struggling to get in. A joyous occasion for so many people who don't want to win, but want to be more healthy for themselves and the people who love them. And just like that, bombs blew up, and it was all over.

Sickening, disgusting and tragic. My stomach is churning. I love that city, I love running there, I love everything about Boston. And now that place will never be quite the same. I guess this happens all over the world to cities on a regular basis. But it is tough when it is my beloved city of Boston.

My thoughts and love and hope go out to everyone involved.

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Mid Year Distance Rankings

Presented without comment.

CHS Distance Female Season Bests

CHS Distance Male Season Bests

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April 15th Weekly Training Plan

Monday: 300 or 200 m repeats at race pace followed by pace changers or broken 500's
Tuesday: Long easy aerobic run
Wednesday: Jay Johnson circuits
Thursday: Slingshots & hand-off Practice
Friday: Loveland Invite for ALL athletes (early dismissal)
Saturday: O.Y.O. fartlek
Sunday: Active rest day

More details to come at practice.
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Rock Canyon JV Invite

Google Image: Canyon

It was a pretty windy day down at Rock Canyon HS yesterday, but I was very pleased with the effort and results of the distance kids this afternoon. Huge shout out to Coach Hawk and Coach Hartman for being in charge on such a blustery day, JV meets are super important to the program and having good coaches there for every one is key.

Google Image: Rock

After sifting through the results, I see a lot of highlights. I am sure I missed a few, but Mariah B. raced very well, as did Landon L. Erika, Ellen, Emily and Kelly all raced well in the 800, and I was super psyched to see ol' Austin S. drop a 2:30 in the open 8. Jessie had a strong race in the wind in the quarter mile, and Cory and Spencer did great in the mile as well.

Let's hope these good performances roll over to tonight and tomorrow.

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Varsity Entries

I apologize for being late with these, but here are some more details for the two meets this weekend.

If you do not know if you are competing this weekend, than you need to CONTACT YOUR INDIVIDUAL DISCIPLINE COACH. I do not know every competitor in every event and what time they start. I know who is competing ont he distance side, but other than that, all questions should be directed to your discipline coach.

The Twilight meet on Friday starts at 3:30. It is a rolling schedule that traditionally falls behind.There are a few people who are competing in the earlier events, (boys triple, boys disc, girls shot, girls sprint med) that should check with Bowman about early dismissal. It might be a case of everyone being officially dismissed at 1:45, but only the athletes who need to be there early should take advantage of that. Everyone else should leave right after school and go directly to the stadium. All JV athletes and Mullen only athletes will be having practice with me right after school.

Mullen is a little different.   You need to be at Mullen at least 75 minutes before your first event is scheduled to go off.  I will be seeing the 4 x 800 kids bright and early. :) Below is the official Mullen schedule.

Event#           Time             Event Name                      Event #     Time        Event Name

1                   8:00am     girls Long Jump                         60         12:55pm     boys 100m

2                   8:00am     girls long Jump                          61           1:00pm     boys 100m

3                   8:00am     girls 4x800 relay                        62           1:05pm     boys 100m

4                   8:15am     girls 4x800 relay invite             63           1:10pm     boys 100m

5                   8:30am     boys 4x800 relay                       64           1:15pm  boys 100 inv.

6                   8:45am     boys 4x800 relay invite            65           1:20pm   girls 300H

7                   9:00am     girls discus                                  66           1:25pm   girls 300H

8                   9:00am     girls high jump                           67           1:30pm   girls 300H

9                   9:00am     boys pole vault                          68           1:35pm  girl 300h inv.

10                 9:00am     boys shot put                             69           1:40pm  boys 300H

11                 9:00am     girls 4x100 relay                        70            1:45pm  boys 300H

12                 9:05am     girls 4x100 relay                        71           1:50pm  boys 300H

13                 9:10am     girls 4x100 relay                        72           1:55pm boy 300h inv.

14                 9:15am     girls 4x100 relay                        73          2:00pm   boys discus

15                 9:20am     girls 4x100 relay invite             74          2:00pm  girls shot put

16                 9:25am     boys 4x100 relay                       75          2:00pm girl sprint R.

17                 9:30am     boys 4x100 relay                       76          2:05pm girl sprint R.

18                 9:35am     boys 4x100 relay                       77          2:10pm girl sprint R.

19                 9:40am     boys 4x100 relay                       78          2:15pm girl sprint R.

20                 9:45am     boys 4x100 relay invite            79         2:20pm girl sprint R.Iv.

Event#            Time             Event Name                     Event#   Time      Event Name

21                  9:50am      girls 1600m                            80       2:25pm  boys 4x200 R.

22                  10:00am    girls 1600m                            81      2:30pm  boys 4x200 R.

23                  10:10am    girls 1600m Invite                 82      2:35pm  boys 4x200 R.

24                  10:10am    boys long jump                      83     2:40pm  boys 4x200 R.

25                  10:10am    boys long jump                      84     2:45pm boy 4x200 R.Inv.

26                  10:20am    boys 1600m                            85    2:50pm  girls 4x200 R.

27                  10:30am    boys 1600m                            86    2:55pm  girls 4x200 R.

28                  10:40am    boys 1600m Invite                 87    3:00pm  girls 4x200 R.

29                  10:45am    boys shot put                         88     3:00pm  boys triple jump

30                  10:45am    girls discus                              89     3:00pm  boys triple jump

31                  10:50am   girls 100mH                             90     3:05pm  girls 4x200 R.

32                  10:55am   girls 100mH                              91    3:10pm girl 4x200 R. Inv.

33                  11:00am   girls 100mH                              92     3:15pm girls 800m

34                  11:05am   girls 100mH                              93     3:20pm  girls 800m

35                  11:10am   girls 100mH invite                   94     3:25pm  girls 800m Inv.

36                  11:20am   boys 110mH                             95     3:30pm  boys 800m

37                  11:25am   boys 110mH                             96     3:35pm  boys 800m

38                  11:30am   boys 110mH                             97     3:40pm  boys 800m Inv.

39                  11:35am   boys 110mH

40                   11:40am  boys 110mH invite                 99      3:50pm  girls 200m

41                   11:45am  girls 400m                                100    3:55pm  girls 200m                                    

42               11:50am    girls 400m                                  101     4:00pm   girls 200m

43               11:55am    girls 400m                                  102      4:05pm  girls 200m Inv.

44                Noon         girls 400m invite                       103      4:10pm  boys 200m

45               12:05pm   boys 400m                                  104      4:15pm  boys 200m

46               12:10pm   boys 400m                                  105      4:20pm  boys 200m

47               12:15pm   boys 400m                                  106      4:25pm  boys 200m Inv.

48               12:15pm  boys high jump                           107      4:30pm girls 3200m Inv.

49               12:15pm   girls discus                                  108      4:45pm boys 3200m Inv

50               12:15pm   girls shot put                               109      5:00pm girls 4x400 R.

51               12:15pm  girls triple jump                           110      5:05pm  girls 4x400 R.

52                12:15pm  girls triple jump                          111      5:10pm  girls 4x400 R.

53                12:20pm  boys 400m invite                        112      5:15pm  girls 4x400 R.

54                12:30pm  girls 100m                                     113     5:20pm girl 4x400 R. Iv

55                12:35pm  girls 100m                                     114     5:25pm  boys 4x400 R.

56                12:40pm  girls 100m                                     115     5:30pm  boys 4x400 R.

57                12:45pm  girls 100m                                     116     5:35pm  boys 4x400 R.

58                12:50pm  girls pole vault                              117    5:40pm  boys 4x400 R.

59                12:50pm  girls 100m Invite                           118   5:45pm boys 4x400 R.Iv

If you are not sure what exact heat you are in, you can go to milesplit.com and click on the Mullen heat sheets. They are too big to be uploaded here on my site. Just match up what "event" you are in to the published time schedule and you are good to go. Get in touch with your discipline coach if you have any questions.

Sorry for the late notice, I hope the clears a lot of things up.

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