The Outdoor Season Has Begun

After a long grueling winter, I am relieved to inform everyone that our outdoor season finally kicked off Saturday at the Moline Invite. I say relieved because it is difficult to keep 15 year olds motivated to do workouts when the next race is still 3 months away. The weather was not suited for world record conditions, but nonetheless, we had a lot of successes, a few mediocre performances and fortunately, no bombs.

Starting off on the girls side, junior star Emily Gustafson cruised to a win the two mile by over 30 seconds, and then came back with a bit of a dissappointing third place finish in the mile. She was quite upset with herself for letting the leaders go, but reassured her that she has heavy legs for the first time in her life (from training all winter, her first time) and that she will feel snappy when the time is right. Freshman Ashely Schmitt placed second in her first two mile ever, running just over 12 min. Again, she was a little dissappointed with herself, but as a coach, I was thrilled to see her compete so well and hang in there with a 20 degree windchill, which is really hard on her asthma. Sophmore Cassie Lohmeir ran her first race of the year, placing 2nd in the 800 with a time of 2:26. Like the other two, she was a bit mad at herself for not going after it earlier, but 2:26 is pretty amazing for a 16 year old who plays basketball all winter and has only been running for 4 weeks. Needless to say, we have a lot of talent on the girls side. Best of all, we had a real desire to work hard, compete and see the long term picture.

There were some great races on the boys side as well. My pic for athlete of the day was definately freshman Alex Cortes, who ran his first two mile ever (hanging in well in A heat) and then came back to place second in his heat of the mile running 4:50!!! I cannot express how happy I was for a kid who has not missed a practice since he started with me last summer. Expect to hear a lot more about him. Sophomore Hugh Gill also ran a 15 second pr in the mile, running 4:45. And last, but not least, my senior twins Shane and Nick Leiby kicked off the season with quick splits in the 4X800 and coming back and placing 3rd and 4th respectively in the open 800. We were all a little dissapointed with the times, as I really thought they would run around 2 min. It made me sit down and try to rethink what I have been doing and what I have planned for the next month. As a coach, you must not put the blame of bad performances on anybody but yourself, and after looking back on all the work we have done over the last 5 months, I have decided to stick with the plan. What really threw me for a loop was, after having heavy legs in both 800s, and thinking the 4x400 splits would be sluggish, Shane lead off the relay with a 50 flat!!! Into a cold headwind with two races under his belt and the first time running really hard all season.

So to sum it up, all-in-all, it was a pretty good start to the season. I do have a lot of injuries, especially with the younger kids. Some of that is my fault, as it took me a while realized that some of them just cannot handle anything but easy 25 min runs. I really believe that now that the races have begun, our level of intensity and urgency will elevate. Like I said before, coaching track is a heck of a lot of problems. Dealing with so many problems and personalities can make a coach feel a bit insane at times, but it is all worth it when you see a kid work his rear off all winter and come out and run 4:50 for his first high school mile ever!!!

Take care all and GO RAIDERS!

tim