Alright Hawks, we are getting amazingly fit, super strong, and ready for our championship season to begin! This past week we had some hard workouts, and everyone did great! This coming week, we are working hard again, getting sharper now that we have built our strength. After this week, our practices will begin to taper and we will get ready to peak for Associations and Regionals!
Speaking of our championship races, please let us know what your availability is over the Thanksgiving weekend. If you aren't planning to participate, we need to know as we figure out our teams. This week's practices are as follows: Monday - Intervals at Marshall Hills (Meet at the Boathouse)
Tuesday - Rest & Stretch Wednesday - On your own
Thursday - Swamp Tempo (Meet at the Boathouse)
Friday - Rest & Stretch Saturday or Sunday - LONG Easy Run
REMEMBER: What you put into your training will dictate what you get out of your races. Train Hard, Win Easy! Coach Eric
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Another big meet - another spectacular performance by this Hawks team! Overall our girl's team finished second in the club division, only losing to the Buffalo Chips - a really impressive feat! Special shout out to Mia who finished as our fifth and final scoring runner as an 8 year old!
Individually, we had so many amazing performances I will struggle to capture them all, but I will try! First, let's compare times for those who ran the same meet last year. Every single Hawk improved their times (except Josie, who was sick), with some of the biggest improvements including Tyler (1:48), Maddi (1:11), Sonia (1:21), Michael (1:45), and Mackenna (1:13). Those are some massive improvements over 1 year! A second way to look at our Hawks' improvements is to measure their quickening mile paces over the season. Putting aside the Cottonwood meet and its uber-challenging hills, it is helpful to look at how improved our athlete's mile pace has been over similar distances, and every Hawk has demonstrated improvement! Natalie, for example, was running around 7 minute pace at the beginning of the season and has held a 6:05/mile pace over the past two meets! David, Jack, Cal, Stella and Hadley have all improved their mile paces by 30 second or more this season, while new runners Max and Mac have improved by nearly 1 minute! This is the goal of our program, improved pace means we are improving all of our "Cs" - capacity, conditioning, and courage! This week we go back to work, with our next meet several weeks away we can put some finishing touches on our conditioning and be ready to compete in our championship season! Here's our schedule for the week: Monday - Intervals at Marshall Hills (Meet at the Boathouse)
Tuesday - Rest & Stretch Wednesday - On your own
Thursday - Swamp Tempo (Meet at the Boathouse)
Friday - Rest & Stretch Saturday or Sunday - LONG Easy Run
REMEMBER: What you put into your training will dictate what you get out of your races. Train Hard, Win Easy! Coach Eric All the Hawks put up impressive performances at the second SRA meet on Friday, with everyone improving their times (except Tyler who fell and still almost ran a PR). What amazing performances by all, but we want to highlight some off the most impressive ones. Gyan had the largest improvement with a 2 minute PR! Natalie had the second biggest PR of 1:07, followed by Mackenna, Mason, and Max who all improved by around 40 seconds. Connor, Pier, Henry, and Maddi all ran the course for the first time, and did great! We also had a number of Hawks medal in this meet, including Elias (as a Miwok), Adeleine, Pier, and Sonia. Special shout out to Natalie who missed grabbing a medal by 2 tenths of a second!
On the team side, we made a serious statement! Our 6th grade and under boys finished 3rd out of 34 teams, while our 6th grade and under girls team finished 4th out of 33 teams! Our 7th/8th girls team also did great, finishing 5th out of 19 teams. Way to go! This coming weekend we compete at the Flat Sac Cross Country Meet, our last meet prior to the Association Championships on Nov 19th. (Some of the Hawks are planning on running in the Clarksburg Country Run 5k on Nov 12th.) Flat Sac is an annual tradition, run at Gibson Ranch north of Sacramento, and is always one of the athletes' favorite courses. The races begin at 9am so we need everyone there by 8am. The tricky part is parking, please see the event info on the Team App for more info. This week's practice schedule is as follows: Monday - Intervals at Marshall Hills (Meet at the Boathouse)
Tuesday - Rest & Stretch Wednesday - On your own
Thursday - Marshall Hill Tempo (Meet at the Boathouse)
Friday - Rest & Stretch Saturday - Flat Sac XC Meet Gibson Ranch, Sac County
Sunday - Long Run on Your Own
REMEMBER: What you put into your training will dictate what you get out of your races. Train Hard, Win Easy! Coach Eric What a great effort by our Hawks this weekend at the NorCal Striders Meet! It was a long drive, but most of our athletes were able to make it and experience real cross country for the first time this season! They competed in their age groups, fought hard on uneven trails up and down steep hills, and finished strong! In this coach's opinion, the 2k was a little too easy, the 4k was super tough, but that 3k course was a perfect cross country challenge - not sure if all our Hawks would agree though!
Across 8 races we earned 6 medals (top 5 finishes) with Elias and Pier winning their age groups, Natalie coming in second in her race, Mia finishing 3rd, and Josie and Audrey nabbing 5th place finishes. That is a great showing for our team! But beyond those, we had a bunch of other notable top-ten efforts. Sonia and Hadley finished just out of the medals in 6th place in their respective races, David finished 7th and Jack 10th in their race, and Max was 9th in his race. The coaches couldn't be happier with where the team is at midseason, and we continue to have high hopes for the team as we move into the second half of our campaign. Remember, while we have a number of upcoming meets, our ultimate goal is to peak for the Association Championships on November 19th (which coincidentally will be on the same course we ran this weekend). This week we have the second SRA meet on Friday afternoon. It will be at American River College again, parking will be $5 and remember that parking gets backed up so try to arrive early to make entry easier. To the extent we can, we need the runners at the tent by 3:45 to get their bibs and start warmups, as the first race begins at 4:45. With a meet on Friday, this week's practice schedule is a little lighter than last week. We are now transitioning from building our strength endurance to sharpening into strength and then speed - metaphorically honing the edge of the blade we have crafted through our hard work so far this season. Here is our schedule: Monday - Intervals at Marshall Hills (Meet at the Boathouse)
Tuesday - Rest & Stretch Wednesday - On your own
Thursday - Swamp Tempo (Meet at the Boathouse)
Friday - SRA Meet #2
Saturday or Sunday - LONG Easy Run
REMEMBER: What you put into your training will dictate what you get out of your races. Train Hard, Win Easy! Coach Eric Delta Hawks are rolling into the middle of the season! We are doing some amazing work, getting into great shape, and avoiding injuries - this is right where we want to be! Next weekend most of us are traveling up to Cottonwood to compete in age group races in the NorCal Striders Youth Cross Country Meet. Our runners in the 8-and-under age group will run a 2k race, our 9-10 and 11-12 age group runners will compete in the 3k, while our 13-14 runners have to complete a 4k. These are the distances our athletes will compete in at Associations, Regionals, and Nationals, so this is a a great trial run for everyone!
Speaking of the end-of-season meets, I added the championship meets to the events on the Team App, and they are on our website calendar (as well as the athletic.net calendar if you're checking that page). There are some unknowns still related to these meets as the details have not been released, but there are some things we know for sure. First, runners have to qualify for Nationals through the Regional Championship, and qualify for Regionals by competing at the Association Championship. The dates are certain: Associations is the Sunday before Thanksgiving (11/19), Regionals is the Sunday after Thanksgiving (11/26), and Nationals is on Saturday, December 9th. Currently, the Association Championship is set to be held at the same course we are visiting this weekend in Cottonwood (though there is some effort to move it to the Bay Area: we will know more in a week). The location for Regionals is definitely Woodward Park in Fresno, and Nationals is Tom Sawyer Park in Louisville, KY. In the past, in order to advance from race to race you need to either be on a top-5 team or in the top 30 in your age group. Without the race details, I don't know if that will still be the case, but let's assume that it will. We have a good chance to get a large group of our kids to Regionals - I want all of our athletes that qualify to be able to join us in Fresno as that course is famous because it hosts the California High School State Championship Meet each year. Based on our current roster, and barring injury, I think we have a 9-10 boys team that will qualify for Regionals, as well as an 11-12 girls team, along with a number of individuals in other age groups. Parents: please see me or Coach Galen to discuss, based on our experience, what it might take for your athlete to advance so we can all be prepared to work hard and compete at the end of the season. For this week, we are still doing the hard mid-season work that builds us toward a successful conclusion to our season. We will be meeting at the Boathouse for the remainder of the season. It will be getting dark earlier and soon we will need to bring headlamps to practice - please be prepared. Here is our schedule for this week: Monday - Intervals at Marshall Hills (Meet at the Boathouse)
Tuesday - Rest & Stretch Wednesday - On your own
Thursday - Marshall Hill Tempo (Meet at the Boathouse)
Friday - Rest & Stretch Saturday - Easy Run if you want Sunday - NorCal Striders Youth Cross Country Meet
REMEMBER: What you put into your training will dictate what you get out of your races. Train Hard, Win Easy! Coach Eric |
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June 2024
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