USATF XC Entry Form

With the USATF Cross Country race fast approaching, (entiures are due on the 28th, send them out Monday or even Saturday if you can!) some people have been asking me for the registration form. D'Oh! That would help, wouldn't it? :) (Too busy pruning trees I guess.)

Here it is, print it out at your leisure.
All the athletes that are presently enrolled in the WTAFC can put down WOLVERINE TRACK AND FIELD CLUB for the club affilitaion, and our club number is 32-0269. Not sure about the club association and region number. My guess would be to leave that blank and we can deal with it at the race. Make sure to not forget six bucks and everything should be all set!

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United State of America Track & Field Cross Country Junior Olympic Qualifier Race Information

On Novemebr 1st, there is a USATF XC JO qualifier race being held right here in Denver. As a group, we raced this race four years ago, if my memory serves me right. I am very excited about his race, DeKoevend Park is a great place to race; good wide starting area, very spectator friendly, nice fast trails, and the people who put on the race are huge fans of running.

I am encouraging all readers of this blog to participate. If you are an active member of WTAFC, this is a great training race for you. If you ran for CHS XC, you are more than welcome to join us. Everyone who runs needs to be a member of USATF, but if you ran winter track for us this past year, you should be all set. If you ran for Sierra XC this fall, you are more than welcome to join us. The more the merrier, in my book.

The details are all outlined in the USATF Info. Brochure, but the main points are as follows:
--The race is on Nov. 1, at DeKoevend Park, which is just north of the corner of University and Arapahoe.
--You will race in your age group, and all age groups start at a different time.
--It's six bucks to race, and you must send in your registration by Oct. 28th. WTAFC will not register you, that is up to you.
--No day of race registration.

It looks like most athletes will be racing between 11:00 and 1:00, so we can meet at my place in the morning, carpool over as a big group, and then race our individual races. I hope we get a big turn-out for this, like I said, this is a great race and I am looking forward to it.

Email me if you have any questions!

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USATF Race

In my morning or searching the internet for races to compete in for the spring, I discovered that the USATF is having a 5 km cross country race at DeKoevend Park on Nov. 1. That is great news, as it will provide a much more specific race than the one in Wash Park would give us. Plus, it looks like the entry fee is six bucks, rather than the 25 for the race this Friday.

I know things have been crazy this week, lots of switching around, so I want to re-cap.

Wednesday-Be ready to go for an 800 m TT at 4:00 sharp! Bring your fast shoes.

Friday-No official WTAFC race in Wash . Park. (Although if you want to race there, you are more than welcome to.)
Instead we will do the regularly scheduled repeat kilometers workout. We will meet at 3:00 at Sierra. Fast shoes would be good.

Saturday-Cheer on at XC State Meet. Active rest day

Next Saturday-USATF Cross Country Race. The park is right down the street from my house, on University and Arapahoe. We will meet at my house and head down from there.

Whew! My eyes hurt from staring at this screen for so long!

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More Logistics

Any opinions on Wednesday? I was thinking, if the athletes are ready to go at 4:00 sharp, then we I can still make it to the dentist. Does that work for you guys?

As for Friday, I did some more thinking about that as well. The race is 25 bucks, pretty steep in my opinion, but typical for a Wash Park race. I can't put my thoughts or my experiences on running a race bandit style out on the world wide web for everyone to read. :) It starts at 6:00, so I suggest we meet at my house at 4:30 to get a good jump on fighting traffic to get there. (Friday afternoon, I-25, yuk.) So, meeting at 4:30, how does that sound?

The track coaches are meeting Thursday evening to discuss the upcoming winter and spring season. Any thing you want discussed amongst the coaches, let me know, either in person, or in the comments.

See you Wednesday night!

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Orienteering Results

The results are up for yesterday's orienteering meet are posted, we did OK for ourselves. I can;t wait for the winter races, the ones we do on snowshoes!

In other riveting news, I got a dentist appointment squeezed in on Wednesday afternoon at 4:45. I know we had planned to do a TT at 4:00, but is there anyway we could possibly change that? Anyway we could go earlier, even at 3:45? The dentist is over by my house, so I would have to leave right after it, but I still want to get this important workout in.

Let me know your thoughts.

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Game Seven

Some thoughts while settling down in to root on the Old Towne Team.

Great week of training, we really ramped it up in terms of intensity, and everyone responded very well. The intensity is going to stay this high until the 22nd of November. Rest will be short, speed will be fast; everything about our workouts is going to be tough. That means you must eat well, stay super-hydrated, and make sure to get plenty of sleep. The recovery runs are important, as well as staying stretched and limber. All of the little things that people do are what allow you to have great workouts, so keep up on all of that.

The orienteering race was awesome today. We had a good turnout of kids and we finally had some courses that Coach Sep could actually handle. I ran with the boys twice, doing both the beginner course and the intermediate course. The girls also went out and tackled the beginner course, and they certainly got their money's worth. From how they described it, they started off a little rough, but once they got into the groove of it, they started rolling through the checkpoints. As usual, it was a blast, but this time, with the open terrain, it was really fun for everyone.

This week's new training schedule is posted in the left sidebar. There are some different start times because of the fall break, but the same type of training will apply. RollerCoasters early on Monday, and a TT on Wednesday afternoon. Friday we decided to participate in a 5 km race to prepare for the Tempe race, the Scream Scram, so check out their website for some more details.

See everyone tomorrow morning, get a good night's sleep, as the Rollercoasters are going to be longer than normal!

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Upcoming Week

Before we get to the normal training, a couple of tangents.

Talked to Thomas on the phone just now, the marathon he ran this past week didn't go as well as he had hoped, but he is now gearing up for a half marathon with his older brother in five days. My god, the guy is a long distance machine! A marathon and a half marathon within two weeks of each other? Ahhhhh.... to be young and 24 again. :)

And earlier this morning, I got an 80 minute walk in with Otis. I listened to the Bill Simmons/Matthew Berry podcast the whole time, and was laughing out loud for most of it. even though they talk a lot of fantasy sports stuff, the chemistry they have with each other is classic, and I might even start listening to the strictly fantasy football/basketball podcasts if both of them are hosting. Funny, funny, stuff.

OK, back to the plans this week. They are updated in the Weekly Training Plans on the left. We had a GREAT 1:20 long run Saturday in the waning hours of daylight. We ran the nice and easy Highline Canal trail, stopped to gawk at all the mansions being built, and then had a huge dinner at Garbanzo's. Great way to spend a practice, in my opinion. (Even though I could barely crawl out of bed this morning. God I am out of shape!) That means today is an easy 45 minute shake-out run, and the rest of the week looks pretty typical.

Beth is getting in from Minnesota on Monday night at six, so we have to be done practice by 5:15 at the latest. I know we are all very busy people, but the earlier we start, the better quality practice we will have. We have nine intervals to do tomorrow, so we will be getting right to business immediately, and we will run a very efficient practice.

Like I said, the rest of the week is pretty normal, and this Sunday is an orienteering race at Chatfield Reservoir State Park. Check the Rocky Mountain Orienteering Club website for all the details. I am definitely signing up for a couple of beginner races, and any orienteering race where we don't have to drive two hours one way sounds like a good one to me! I just hope I can make it. I know I have a class for teacher re-certification on Saturday (hence the running on your own that day), and I don't know if it will carry over into Sunday. Grrrrr..... silly classes. :)

Let's hope for some good training weather this week, but if it is not, we will proceed with the plan as normal. That means, bring warm clothes with you, will be outside more often than not!

See you all tomorrow!
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New Feature!

I added a feature to the blog that I have been wanting to update for a while now. I have a new section entitled "Collegiate Varsity Alumni" that celebrates all of the kids that have come through the program and are now competing in varsity athletics at the collegiate level. I have two athletes up now, but there are more to come.

However, there are so many kids from CHS Track that are competing in college, that I might have forgotten one or two. (My bad.) If that is you, please, shoot me an email with a cool picture, and I will get you up there as soon as I can!

Thanks!

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Schedule Changes

Good morning everyone,

We discussed some schedule changes for this week, due to days off from school and other pressing matters. The changes are detailed in the weekly schedule on the left of the page. That is the beauty of such a small close-knit group, we can make these changes on the fly, and everyone can still usually make it to practice!

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The Importance of Rest

Well, this week we didn’t do a lot of training & running as a group. We had a great RollerCoaster workout on Monday, then a tough windy workout on Thursday, and that was pretty much it as group. Beth & I missed seeing everyone on Saturday, it was the first Saturday morning in long time that Otis didn’t get his weekly WTAFC dosage.

But, the week that we had (three easy long runs, a couple extra active rest days) is really going to help us in the long term. As a program, we always seem to struggle in the immediate aftermath of rest days. I think that is why Thursday was so hard for us. But, in the weeks that come, this rest will help us out a lot as a team. Resting helps the muscular mitochondria grow back in greater numbers, it gives our lungs a break to recover from breathing so hard every day. It allows our mind to re-charge, to let that hunger for speed grow again, and to give us some perspective on what we are trying to accomplish. Prescribed rest, measured rest, disciplined rest, is the only way to truly break through to other levels in our running, which is why this past week was so important for us.

So, last week was our rest week, now we are jumping right back into the normal routine. Keep your eyes on the schedule on the left side of the page, but we are going to go with Mondays will be RollerCoasters at Sierra, Wednesdays are a long run behind Sierra, and Fridays are repeat kilos at Sierra. Saturday, we will be back at my house to do a long run with some tempo and technique work (and a trip to Einstein’s Bagels) for some Otis face time.

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P.S. Hopefully everyone has their plane tickets for Arizona, things are coming together quickly!

Adjusted Weekly Schedule

First off, did you notice that Haile Gebrselassie won the Berlin Marathon in Germany in a new world record time? He ran a 2:03:59!! By running 26 consecutive 4:48 miles, he became the first runner ever under 2:04 in a marathon. Sure, Berlin is famous for having a flat fast course, but that is still a very, very impressive achievement.

Now, back to the original direction of this post. Last week was a pretty hard week of training, an di am getting the feeling that people are on the verge of "breaking down". Of course, we don't want that to happen, so we are going to change things up a bit this week. It is a good week to do this, as I have some teacher classes I need to attend at the end of the week, so this schedule should work for all.

So, Monday will be RollerCoaster Intervals at Sierra at 3:25. Tuesday and Wednesday will be active rest days. Both days, 20-30 min easy recovery runs on your own. Thursday will be Off-Road Ladders at Sierra at 3:25.

The next two days, I believe I have class, just not sure what time. So, these days are on your own as well. Friday will be a 60 min recovery run on your own. There is an orienteering race up in Nederland on Saturday if you want to participate in that, otherwise, an overdistance run is in order, at least 90 minutes for both genders. Run on flat trails, and focus on your form and your breathing. Sunday is just like today, a 45-60 minute recovery run.

This should be a good week of rest for us, we have stressed the body pretty good the last two weeks, not we need to let it grow back stronger. Easy run today, and see you all after school on Monday.

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Great Showing!

I read that the guys running for CHS XC got 3 in the top twenty yesterday at the Dave Sanders Invite. That's pretty impressive! Great job!

Full House!

Well, I was wrong in my assumption that we might have less than a full team show up this morning! We had a full house, all six athletes ready and eager to go at 6:15! It was a pretty brutal workout, not during our normal running time, hard terrain, fast times to hit; but everyone performed admirably throughout the morning. Great job!

And good luck to the CHS XC runners this afternoon at Clement Park!

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Early Morning practice

It's about five in the morning, practice starts in about an hour. Who will show up? Will we have a full house, or just one kid? 6:15 is pretty early to be running intervals, but it's the only time we can do it today.

My ski coach in college used to have 6:00 am practice on Tuesday and Thursdays. It was strictly conditioning. Sit-ups, push ups, plyometrics. He had it just to see who who show up or not. I admit, I am sure I missed a few, but god did they suck. It was always freezing cold outside, everyone was bundled up in their varsity issue sweats, and we were doing crunches. Yuk. But, my coach always got a good idea of who was truly dedicated or not. And after practice, the kids living in the dorms would do to breakfast in the dining hall, the kids who lived off-campus would go back home to sleep, and the coaches would go to Young's for coffee. I guess those practices were OK if you were a coach. :)

Sierra Middle School Athlete of the Month

I'm starting a new feature here on Sep's Blog. Most people who read this blog think I am a high school track coach first, but my real job is being an 8th grade science teacher at Sierra Middle School. I am lucky enough there to be able to work with the 7th & 8th grade cross country team, as well most of the other sports and clubs here at Sierra. This allows me to see a lot of very talented athletes strut their stuff. So, I figured it would be a good idea to give some of them some internet recognition.

The criteria for this award is vague, the judging is biased, and the facts are probably inaccurate to a degree. However, the student chosen truly is a fantastic athlete by any standards, and deserves to be recognized. Without any further adu, here is the SMS Athlete of the Month for September.

MACKENZIE HIRSCH

Mackenzie is a cross country runner here at SMS. She is an 8th grader on Team Owl, and she also plays competitive club soccer. Mackenzie was chosen for this award because she placed fourth overall at the middle school district championship meet held two weeks ago. Mackenzie was consistently the fastest female runner on the team, as well as a respected role model, tireless worker, and mature leader. Her times over 1.5 mile courses were always in the low ten minute range, and she improved greatly throughout the season. Congratulations, Mackenzie, you are the SMS Athlete of the Month for September!