Well, it is finally here. Since last November we have had this weekend in mind - the GSC championships at Veterans' Park in Hoover, AL. We had a terrible race last year, finishing 7th in the men's race after a school record 5th place finish the year before. It ended a 3 year run of ever higher finishes and it left a bad taste in our mouths. We have trained better this year than ever before. We are runnig better this year than ever before. All that remains is to put it all together in tomorrow's race.
These things are always, at least for me, difficult to predict. Depending on how other teams perform, we could finish anywhere from 2nd to 5th. We have 2 freshmen in our top 5 and that is a little scary, as they are relatively inexperienced in this type of race at the collegiate level. However, they are both talented kids and if they let their talent work for them, they could come up big for us.
We did a small taper this week, but not a whole lot. We did 4x1 mile on Monday instead of our usual 5 and did them with three minutes rest instead of our usual two minutes. The workout went well and it was over a relatively challenging loop. On Wednesday we did 3 x 800m-600m-400m and it went extremely well. Thursday and Friday were just easy mileage days with strides at the end of the run. As the saying goes, "The hay is in the barn" so we'll just have to wait and see how it all plays out. If our guys run smart, I like our chances. The worst case scenario is that the younger kids let their emotions get the best of them and they go out too hard and fade at the end of the race. We've done all we can to make sure this doesn't happen, but, once again, one never knows what will transpire.
Regardless of how the race turns out, I am very pleased with how our freshmen performed this year. They have been a very dedicated, hard working group and we'll have a strong core back for next year's team - losing only our 3 seniors - Austin Enriquez, Jonathan Sellers and Craig Warlick.
The women's team is whole different kettle of fish. We have been plagued by injuries all year long - Jessica Gonzalez had a calf/shin problem that kept her from regular training for 6 months in the middle of the season, after she got off to a great start. Kelli Hartley tried to run through a case of plantar fascitis and developed a stress fracture and missed 8 weeks of regular training. Both girls have been back with us for one week and now, Kelli, who did the best job of cross training I have ever seen, is getting sick. We can't expect a lot out of these girls with just one week of running under their belts. They were going to be our #3 and #4 runners this year so it really hurts our chances of moving up in the conference standings. Our top 2 girls, Polina Babkina and Carolyn Mancuso are running well and should perform up to par in the race. The key for us will be how well our pack performs. How much improvement can Amy Benoit and Kirstie Lusignan and Anne Enoch show in this race. They have been running well in training and have all run PR's or near PR's at one time or another this year, but the questions remains: Can they continue this rate of improvement in tomorrow's race and the NCAA regional in 2 weeks. Impossible to tell. We'll know in about 23 hours.
That's about it for now. Got to go get the vans gassed up and loaded up and get all our extra spikes, tape, etc all on board. I'll post results tomorrow.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Monday, November 1, 2010
Monday of GSC week
Well, GSC week has officially begun. Our conference championship race is Saturday, Nov 6th. Today, Monday Nov 1, we started our mini-taper for conference. (We won't do a full-blown taper until the week before the NCAA South Regional on Nov 20th.
Today the men ran 4 x 1 mile at goal pace for Saturday's race with 3' rest. We usually have less rest - 90"-2:00 - but this is part of our mini-taper. We also usually do 5 repeats but reduced it by one to give the guys a bit more rest. The women ran a tempo run today - 3.6 miles on one of our on-campus loops. They usually do 5 miles but we reduced that workout as well.
The workouts went along smoothly. Everyone managed to stay relaxed and run within themselves. Our only concern is Peter who still seems to have zero energy. He went to see the doctor this morning and we are waiting to hear what might be ailing him. He hasn't run well in over 2 weeks now. We may have to switch his place on the GSC roster with one of our alternates - Evan Lemons. If Pete can't run, that would be a blow to our chances. When right, he is right in the mix for our top 4-5 spots.
We have an easy day tomorrow morning and then, on Wednesday, our last quality session of the week - 3 x 800-600-400 on our new grass track with 90" rest after each interval. Again, not much volume - only 5400m - with longer than usual rest periods. Hopefully, enough to keep us sharp and still let us rest enough to get the supercompensation rebound effect we are looking for.
Thursday and Friday will both be easy days without much volume. Just some strides after the runs and, hopefully, we'll be ready to run fast on Saturday.
Long range weather forecast is for a totally sunny day with a high of 60F and a low of 32F that morning. Should be perfect for our 9 AM (women) and 10 AM (men) races.
We are already starting to feel that excitement that comes from an important race in which you know you have a good chance of doing well.
Today the men ran 4 x 1 mile at goal pace for Saturday's race with 3' rest. We usually have less rest - 90"-2:00 - but this is part of our mini-taper. We also usually do 5 repeats but reduced it by one to give the guys a bit more rest. The women ran a tempo run today - 3.6 miles on one of our on-campus loops. They usually do 5 miles but we reduced that workout as well.
The workouts went along smoothly. Everyone managed to stay relaxed and run within themselves. Our only concern is Peter who still seems to have zero energy. He went to see the doctor this morning and we are waiting to hear what might be ailing him. He hasn't run well in over 2 weeks now. We may have to switch his place on the GSC roster with one of our alternates - Evan Lemons. If Pete can't run, that would be a blow to our chances. When right, he is right in the mix for our top 4-5 spots.
We have an easy day tomorrow morning and then, on Wednesday, our last quality session of the week - 3 x 800-600-400 on our new grass track with 90" rest after each interval. Again, not much volume - only 5400m - with longer than usual rest periods. Hopefully, enough to keep us sharp and still let us rest enough to get the supercompensation rebound effect we are looking for.
Thursday and Friday will both be easy days without much volume. Just some strides after the runs and, hopefully, we'll be ready to run fast on Saturday.
Long range weather forecast is for a totally sunny day with a high of 60F and a low of 32F that morning. Should be perfect for our 9 AM (women) and 10 AM (men) races.
We are already starting to feel that excitement that comes from an important race in which you know you have a good chance of doing well.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
One Week To Go!!!!!!
Our conference meet is one week away - Saturday Nov 6th at Veterans' Park, next to Spain Park High School, in Hoover, AL.
We concluded a hard week of training this morning. We will start cutting back a little bit on mileage this week in preparation for the conference championsip race.
On Tuesday, we ran 7 x 800m on our grass track with 60" recoveries. That put a little bit of speed in our legs for the main workout of the week - what we call the Oregon for short. It is a 10K race simulator - the runners do 1200m (3x400) at 3 paces - faster than race pace, close to race pace and close to tempo pace. They then go out on our grass loop for a 2.75 mi tempo run which ends on the track and starts another 1200 at close to race pace leading out to another 2.75 mi at tempo pace and closing with another 1200(3 x 400) at close to tempo pace down to close to race pace down to faster than race pace.
Both of these workouts went well, especially the Oregon. It is such a good indicator of fitness and race readiness. Doing well on it really built up our team's confidence. They know they are fit and race ready because they did so well on this workout.
Today's training session was a hard run up a very hilly dirt road - total distance of 8.48 miles measured with a Garmin satellite watch. It was one of our very best training sessions of the entire season - we had 5 runners average under 6:00 per mile for this difficult road along with 4 others who were within 10" per mile of averaging 6:00/mi. All told, we have had 7 runners go under 6:00 per mile for this workout - 3 of the 5 times we did it we ran 10 miles as opposed to 8.48. This is really a test of one's ability to concentrate and focus. The road is essntially uphill most of the way and it's a very demaning session. So we have seen that our speed is up to par, our race fitness is up to par and we can grind out a sustained effort over a long (8.48 mi) period of time.
All that's left for us now is a recovery run tomorrow - 8-10 miles for our guys and 8 miles for our girls.
Monday we will do some intervals - repeat miles for the guys and repeat 800's for the girls.
Wednesday will be a short, peppy workout 3 x 800-600-400 with good rest after each/
Thursday and Friday will be short easy days with some strides and we hope we will be ready to rumble on Saturday morning.
We've put in some excellent work so far his year. I hope the guys do well enough so they will feel it was all worth it. I do know this - this is the best team we have had - by far - since I have been at UWA and, according to records, since we joined the GSC almost 20 years ago.
Fingers crossed.
We concluded a hard week of training this morning. We will start cutting back a little bit on mileage this week in preparation for the conference championsip race.
On Tuesday, we ran 7 x 800m on our grass track with 60" recoveries. That put a little bit of speed in our legs for the main workout of the week - what we call the Oregon for short. It is a 10K race simulator - the runners do 1200m (3x400) at 3 paces - faster than race pace, close to race pace and close to tempo pace. They then go out on our grass loop for a 2.75 mi tempo run which ends on the track and starts another 1200 at close to race pace leading out to another 2.75 mi at tempo pace and closing with another 1200(3 x 400) at close to tempo pace down to close to race pace down to faster than race pace.
Both of these workouts went well, especially the Oregon. It is such a good indicator of fitness and race readiness. Doing well on it really built up our team's confidence. They know they are fit and race ready because they did so well on this workout.
Today's training session was a hard run up a very hilly dirt road - total distance of 8.48 miles measured with a Garmin satellite watch. It was one of our very best training sessions of the entire season - we had 5 runners average under 6:00 per mile for this difficult road along with 4 others who were within 10" per mile of averaging 6:00/mi. All told, we have had 7 runners go under 6:00 per mile for this workout - 3 of the 5 times we did it we ran 10 miles as opposed to 8.48. This is really a test of one's ability to concentrate and focus. The road is essntially uphill most of the way and it's a very demaning session. So we have seen that our speed is up to par, our race fitness is up to par and we can grind out a sustained effort over a long (8.48 mi) period of time.
All that's left for us now is a recovery run tomorrow - 8-10 miles for our guys and 8 miles for our girls.
Monday we will do some intervals - repeat miles for the guys and repeat 800's for the girls.
Wednesday will be a short, peppy workout 3 x 800-600-400 with good rest after each/
Thursday and Friday will be short easy days with some strides and we hope we will be ready to rumble on Saturday morning.
We've put in some excellent work so far his year. I hope the guys do well enough so they will feel it was all worth it. I do know this - this is the best team we have had - by far - since I have been at UWA and, according to records, since we joined the GSC almost 20 years ago.
Fingers crossed.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Men have a great race
We ran in the UAH Invitational at the Oakville Mound course this past weekend. The men won their race in a squeaker beating UAH 47-55. The women finished 3rd in their race.
The men's race was exciting and we didn't find out until the awards ceremony who had won. We had 4 runners break 27' for the 8K race. Freshman David Farist who had previously run 16:45 was not able to make the trip but that gives us 5 runners who have broken 27' this year - the first time that has happened since I assumed the coaching duties 5 years ago. It is a sign that we are on the right track - we are getting more talented runners and they are working hard - a great combination. Additionally, we have 2 other runners who are close to breaking 27' but just haven't been quite able to do it yet.
We were able to beat UAH, who were ranked ahead of us in the South region rankings. So, we should be able to move up a bit in the rankings this week. If we do, it will be the highest ranking in school history. The trick, of course, is to end up high in the rankings - they are based soley on finish at the NCAA regional 10K being held this year at Sharon Johnston Park in Huntsville. The win did a lot of good for our team's confidence and should help a lot as we head into our pre-conference training cycle.
The women had a bit of an off day - no one ran quite up to their capabilities. I know they have a good bit more in them and I am hoping it comes out at the conference meet in 2 weeks.
I always love going to Oakville Mounds - it is a special place with the Indian culture and lore permeating the grounds. With the burial mounds right on site, it is an almost eerie kind of atmosphere whenever I go there. Coach Cain (UAH) said he would try to host an annual meet there and I definitely would look forward to going back again.
The men's race was exciting and we didn't find out until the awards ceremony who had won. We had 4 runners break 27' for the 8K race. Freshman David Farist who had previously run 16:45 was not able to make the trip but that gives us 5 runners who have broken 27' this year - the first time that has happened since I assumed the coaching duties 5 years ago. It is a sign that we are on the right track - we are getting more talented runners and they are working hard - a great combination. Additionally, we have 2 other runners who are close to breaking 27' but just haven't been quite able to do it yet.
We were able to beat UAH, who were ranked ahead of us in the South region rankings. So, we should be able to move up a bit in the rankings this week. If we do, it will be the highest ranking in school history. The trick, of course, is to end up high in the rankings - they are based soley on finish at the NCAA regional 10K being held this year at Sharon Johnston Park in Huntsville. The win did a lot of good for our team's confidence and should help a lot as we head into our pre-conference training cycle.
The women had a bit of an off day - no one ran quite up to their capabilities. I know they have a good bit more in them and I am hoping it comes out at the conference meet in 2 weeks.
I always love going to Oakville Mounds - it is a special place with the Indian culture and lore permeating the grounds. With the burial mounds right on site, it is an almost eerie kind of atmosphere whenever I go there. Coach Cain (UAH) said he would try to host an annual meet there and I definitely would look forward to going back again.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
It's a beautiful day in the Heart of Dixie
It's a little past 7 AM on a beautiful Sunday morning and we are finishing up our long run. Campus is very, very quiet after last night's Homecoming football game. I guess everyone is sleeping off the effects of a UWA TD pass with no time remaining on the clock. What an incredible finish to a see-saw contest. Pundits had predicted that the last team to have the ball would likely win and that was UWA last evening.
Earlier in the day we "ran" the homecoming 5K - we ran quite easy and used it as a warm-up for our steady state run - the men ran 10 miles and the women 8. The steady state run was done on a nearby dirt road - pretty hilly - and we had some of our best training performances of the season. It is good to see that our strength is remaining at a high level since we have focused more on speed the past week.
Results from across the conference suggest we can compete favorably with all but one of the teams we finished behind last year. If we stay healthy and run a smart race at conference, I think we'll be able to move up 2-3 spots, if not more.
We have our last "regular season" race this coming weekend at the Oakville Mounds course in north Alabama. It is the site of the Alabama state high school meet so we know it is accurately measured. It is a beautiful course, located in a park where some very old Indian ruins are located. It is a great place to visit and an even better place to run. Several conference schools will be there so we are hoping to compete well.
We have repeat 2000's tomorrow and a combo workout of 300m hills and 400m repeats on Wednesday and then 2 easier, mileage days before the Saturday race. After that, it's just 2 weeks until the GSC conference meet - one of the two meets towards which we have been pointing all year.
The weather is cooling and it's starting to get exciting!
Earlier in the day we "ran" the homecoming 5K - we ran quite easy and used it as a warm-up for our steady state run - the men ran 10 miles and the women 8. The steady state run was done on a nearby dirt road - pretty hilly - and we had some of our best training performances of the season. It is good to see that our strength is remaining at a high level since we have focused more on speed the past week.
Results from across the conference suggest we can compete favorably with all but one of the teams we finished behind last year. If we stay healthy and run a smart race at conference, I think we'll be able to move up 2-3 spots, if not more.
We have our last "regular season" race this coming weekend at the Oakville Mounds course in north Alabama. It is the site of the Alabama state high school meet so we know it is accurately measured. It is a beautiful course, located in a park where some very old Indian ruins are located. It is a great place to visit and an even better place to run. Several conference schools will be there so we are hoping to compete well.
We have repeat 2000's tomorrow and a combo workout of 300m hills and 400m repeats on Wednesday and then 2 easier, mileage days before the Saturday race. After that, it's just 2 weeks until the GSC conference meet - one of the two meets towards which we have been pointing all year.
The weather is cooling and it's starting to get exciting!
Thursday, October 14, 2010
It's been awhile
It's been a while since I posted our last blog. Much has happened since then so let me at least summarize for you.
We raced on Oct 9th at Jacksonville State University - a DI school about 3 hours from UWA. The races went well - our men won their race and brought home some nice hardware. Our women ran well and finished 3rd overall in the meet.
We had 3 runners finish in the top 10 and 5 runners finish in the top 15 of their race and earn a very attractive t-shirt as a prize. The team trophy was a very nice glass plaque shaped like a mountain - a very welcome relief from the traditional "cheesy" trophy or wooden plaque. Our times were not as fast as we had originally hoped. The race went off close to 11 AM and it had warmed considerably by then - the radio announced it was a record high for that date of the year. Also, we had trained very hard the previous 2 weeks with only an easy run the day before the race, so our guys' legs were tired and heavy to start with. We left knowing that when we do taper, we are going to be running strong.
Our women had 2 runners in the top 5. Our # 3 and # 4 runners were not able to race due to injuries and it looks like they might not race again this year. By the time they are cleared to resume training it may be too close to the conference and/or regional meet to get them ready. We'll have to wait and see. In the meantime, our # 5 and # 6 girls have picked up the pace a good bit lately and, hopefully, they will continue to improve right up until the conference race.
We took the Sunday after the race off and started another 2 week training cycle on Monday, the 11th. The guys ran 2 mile repeats on that Monday and the girls ran 2 mile tempo repeats at tempo pace. Yesterday we did our first real speed session of the year - 400m repeats on our newly measured/mowed grass track. They all loved being able to run on flat, well cared for grass. They were able to really stretch it out and our times were the fastest we've had at UWA since I have been here. The guys did 16x400 with one minute rest and the ladies did 12x400 with one minute rest.
Today was an aerobic mileage run and tomorrow will be an easy recovery run for everybody.
Saturday is Homecoming at UWA and we are going to "participate" in the annual 5K - we are going to run/jog it as a warm-up before we head to a nearby hilly, dirt road to do a hard 10 mile run (men) and 8 mile run (women)- sort of a very long tempo run.
Our next race is a little over a week away now. We will run at the Oakville Mounds course where the Alabama state meet is held each year. It is a beautiful course and reasonably fast. The weather looks like it might be fairly cool - it is 4 hours north of us and at a higher elevation so conditions might be ripe for a fast run.
Only 3 weeks until conference now. After the Oakville Mounds race we will go into our "conference training mode" which includes a light, semi-taper, but not much of one. Our main race is the NCAA South Regional - a 10K which will be run at Sharon Johnston park in Huntsville, AL.
It is going to be a lot of fun to see how our runners do - they have had a great year of training and are close to ready.
We raced on Oct 9th at Jacksonville State University - a DI school about 3 hours from UWA. The races went well - our men won their race and brought home some nice hardware. Our women ran well and finished 3rd overall in the meet.
We had 3 runners finish in the top 10 and 5 runners finish in the top 15 of their race and earn a very attractive t-shirt as a prize. The team trophy was a very nice glass plaque shaped like a mountain - a very welcome relief from the traditional "cheesy" trophy or wooden plaque. Our times were not as fast as we had originally hoped. The race went off close to 11 AM and it had warmed considerably by then - the radio announced it was a record high for that date of the year. Also, we had trained very hard the previous 2 weeks with only an easy run the day before the race, so our guys' legs were tired and heavy to start with. We left knowing that when we do taper, we are going to be running strong.
Our women had 2 runners in the top 5. Our # 3 and # 4 runners were not able to race due to injuries and it looks like they might not race again this year. By the time they are cleared to resume training it may be too close to the conference and/or regional meet to get them ready. We'll have to wait and see. In the meantime, our # 5 and # 6 girls have picked up the pace a good bit lately and, hopefully, they will continue to improve right up until the conference race.
We took the Sunday after the race off and started another 2 week training cycle on Monday, the 11th. The guys ran 2 mile repeats on that Monday and the girls ran 2 mile tempo repeats at tempo pace. Yesterday we did our first real speed session of the year - 400m repeats on our newly measured/mowed grass track. They all loved being able to run on flat, well cared for grass. They were able to really stretch it out and our times were the fastest we've had at UWA since I have been here. The guys did 16x400 with one minute rest and the ladies did 12x400 with one minute rest.
Today was an aerobic mileage run and tomorrow will be an easy recovery run for everybody.
Saturday is Homecoming at UWA and we are going to "participate" in the annual 5K - we are going to run/jog it as a warm-up before we head to a nearby hilly, dirt road to do a hard 10 mile run (men) and 8 mile run (women)- sort of a very long tempo run.
Our next race is a little over a week away now. We will run at the Oakville Mounds course where the Alabama state meet is held each year. It is a beautiful course and reasonably fast. The weather looks like it might be fairly cool - it is 4 hours north of us and at a higher elevation so conditions might be ripe for a fast run.
Only 3 weeks until conference now. After the Oakville Mounds race we will go into our "conference training mode" which includes a light, semi-taper, but not much of one. Our main race is the NCAA South Regional - a 10K which will be run at Sharon Johnston park in Huntsville, AL.
It is going to be a lot of fun to see how our runners do - they have had a great year of training and are close to ready.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Rough Road
Rough Road is an 8.6 mile long dirt road with some difficult hills - of the 8.6 total miles, probably 6 or more of them are uphill, with a final steep hill of about 800m to finish off the run.
On Saturdays when we don't race we travel to Rough Road - it's about 7 miles from school. Today we increased the men's distance to 10 miles by starting 1.4 miles away from the start of the dirt road on a flat, paved surface. The women ran the full 8.6 miles on Rough Road.
The workout went extremely well for us - the weather was perfect - maybe in the low 50's when the workout began at 6:45 AM. Every runner ran his/her fastest time of the year for this particular workout, some by more than 2 minutes. All of the women met or exceeded the goal times we set for them and 9 of our 13 male runners met or exceeded the goal times set for them. 4 of the remaining 5 were close to their goal times and only one runner wasn't able to come close. He did, however, improved his best time by more than 2 minutes, so it was still a very good run.
Everyone was pretty pumped after the workout ended and started talking about how we are going to increase the distance to 11 miles for the next run. They ran great times last Saturday in our Memphis race and had 2 excellent workouts this week leading up to today's run, so their confidence is very high at this point of the season.
We have our weekly long run tomorrow morning at a different complex of dirt roads about 10 minutes from school.
Next Saturday we return to Jacksonville State University for 8K and 5K races. It's a course we already know from our first race of the season when the guys ran 5K and the ladies ran 2 miles. I would rate it a pretty fast course so we will be looking for some additional PR's to go along with those we ran in Memphis last week.
Long range forecasts are for good weather - cool mornings to train and no major rain to speak of. I hope it will hold for Saturday's race.
On Saturdays when we don't race we travel to Rough Road - it's about 7 miles from school. Today we increased the men's distance to 10 miles by starting 1.4 miles away from the start of the dirt road on a flat, paved surface. The women ran the full 8.6 miles on Rough Road.
The workout went extremely well for us - the weather was perfect - maybe in the low 50's when the workout began at 6:45 AM. Every runner ran his/her fastest time of the year for this particular workout, some by more than 2 minutes. All of the women met or exceeded the goal times we set for them and 9 of our 13 male runners met or exceeded the goal times set for them. 4 of the remaining 5 were close to their goal times and only one runner wasn't able to come close. He did, however, improved his best time by more than 2 minutes, so it was still a very good run.
Everyone was pretty pumped after the workout ended and started talking about how we are going to increase the distance to 11 miles for the next run. They ran great times last Saturday in our Memphis race and had 2 excellent workouts this week leading up to today's run, so their confidence is very high at this point of the season.
We have our weekly long run tomorrow morning at a different complex of dirt roads about 10 minutes from school.
Next Saturday we return to Jacksonville State University for 8K and 5K races. It's a course we already know from our first race of the season when the guys ran 5K and the ladies ran 2 miles. I would rate it a pretty fast course so we will be looking for some additional PR's to go along with those we ran in Memphis last week.
Long range forecasts are for good weather - cool mornings to train and no major rain to speak of. I hope it will hold for Saturday's race.
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