Updated!!!! Team Blogs – Coe-Brown Girls & Mascenic Week 2

Mascenic Cross Country: Week 2

 This week was another hot one, but the heat was a bit more manageable. However, that didn’t stop us from taking the opportunity to swim twice this week on our easy and long runs. So far all our swimming this season has been done at the Bankee Bridge, although we do have a few more spots to introduce to the freshmen when the time is right. The bridge is about seven feet high, perfect for flips and other tricks, or simply jumping in. The water is almost too warm from the summer to be refreshing, so you have to swim around to find a cold spot.

While swimming is a favorite activity of mine during an easy run, I did spend one day this week exploring some of the trails behind the school that were discovered and cleared out about ten years ago by the Mascenic cross country team. The trails all connect and can get you lost at first, but that’s part of the fun. My group went out with our coach though, so while none of us went missing, there were other groups finding themselves quite disorientated. Everyone made it back eventually, which is what counts.

Our first workout of the week involved a three minute on and three minute off run of the cross country course. Running our home course during this workout gives everyone a glimpse at how the course feels at faster speeds. Also it gives the freshmen and first time runners an introduction to up-tempo efforts, which is great prep for later in the season.

Our second workout was on the track. We are always doing workouts in different locations. Never can we be found in the same spot for each workout. This workout involved three-hundred meter repeats. How many? Eight to ten for most, with the big-dogs doing twelve. We run these continuously with a recovery in between. Everyone has a time to hit which is on track for their 5k goal pace. Our girls and most boys were hitting their times and able to keep their goals in check. For me, I was able to get ten done (and still feel good), all at goal pace, with the last ones dipping under the time I was trying to hit. This was the case for most of our athletes, which is a step in the right direction towards our team goals.

Briana Boulerice – Mascenic Cross Country

Coe-Brown Girls XC Week 2

Hey! It’s Julia Cormier from Coe Brown. This week’s been a crazy one for the student-athletes of Coe-Brown. Trying to get back into the swing of things of getting up early, dealing with teachers, being assigned tons of homework and going to practice, is a tough adjustment. Through it all, we have all found some way make it fun. Taking team pictures for the yearbook, running to Little Bow Pond near our campus and doing two workouts are just a few of the things we have accomplished this week. A big highlight for me was running over a slippery bridge surrounded by rocks, and wiping out in front of a group of freshman boys during our tempo run. Two giant cuts and a lot of blood later, we all made it back and laughed about the whole thing.

The coaches put on a team cookout this week to help inform all the new parents of the many things about cross country. Giving both Coach Cox and Coach Tkaczyk a microphone in front of the entire team and their parents quickly made our cookout feel like a hilarious talk show. It was awesome. We also ran our long run at Pawtuckaway State Park this past Saturday. We went to the Boulder Fields and adventured through the giant rocks, but we may have overestimated how quickly we could get back as the long run went a bit over the prescribed distance. When we all decided to race up the giant hill to the parking lot, it made everything seem worth it. All the hard work of the week didn’t hold us back! Then both the boys’ and girls’ team went to a Liz Danis’s house close by and had a huge pancake breakfast. With our first meet coming up next week, the team is working hard and getting pumped for the upcoming season. We hope everyone around the state is too!

Julia Cormier – CBNA Girls XC senior

 Coe-Brown Girls XC: Summer Recap

Hi, Elisabeth Danis here, about to start my fourth season as a Coe-Brown athlete, and as a team, we just wanted to give you a little recap of what our summer training was like out here in Northwood. Although we lost two seniors, Hannah Parker and Katie Scannell, we still had a great summer of trail running and logging in the miles.

We got together to do quite a few of our runs this summer. Though many of us worked, we were able to create time to come together and get our legs moving. Just exploring the trails during the summer is a great time, and looking at the changes (or lack thereof) from year to year was a really neat thing. Jumping in the water to cool off after was probably our favorite part. Our favorite run of the summer was probably the long run in Maine, because we had some beautiful views – and getting to accomplish a long run together is always something that’s really fun.

Now, we’re back in school, which means back to our normal practices. It’s nice to get to run with everyone consistently! For one of our first runs of the ‘official’ season, we ran through Pawtuckaway State Park and then had a much-needed pancake breakfast. Now that we’re all together again, coaches and athletes, we’ve been able to start forming our goals for this year. We’re looking forward to competing throughout the season, at States and MOC’s again. We’ve got our sights set on New Englands, and anything after that will be icing on top of the cake. With everyone looking strong, we feel as if there’s a lot we can accomplish in 2015.  We can’t wait to get out there and get the ball rolling. Cross country is a really special and fun season, and we can’t wait to see what it brings.

We hope you’re all as excited for XC as we are!

CBNA Girls XC

 Mascenic Cross Country: Week 1

Well, the first day back certainly was a hot one. Those of us that are returnees were on the track first thing Monday morning for a ten lap time trial to gauge where we were at after the summer work. This is an on and off workout that we can compare to previous seasons.  This gives Coach Smith and ourselves a peek into our relative fitness and what the next steps will be. This is the only two-a-day practice, as all the ‘newbies’ joined us for the afternoon session. We hit the mother lode regarding freshmen, as eleven of them and two new upperclassmen greatly outnumber those of us on the team from last year. What does this look like in action? A lot more of explaining workouts, easy runs, and the purpose behind each day’s task.

Day two veterans were hoping for a run that would allow for some relief from the heat. The team broke off into groups with different routes that all ended at the same spot. The Bankee Bridge has been a favorite swimming spot of ours and allowed for a refreshing dip before finishing the last two miles of the long run for the week. Day three was hills, our baby ones, with the new members experiencing a continuous hill workout executed on one of the hottest days of the week. Overall the results were satisfactory, with runners reaching the number of repeats they were assigned, and in some cases surpassing them.

Saturday we kicked off the start of the season at the New Hampshire Cross Country Festival. Finally, for the first time in a long time, the girls’ competed as a legitimate team. With five females sporting the Mascenic uniform top, we can officially compete as a group for the first time in a few years and it feels pretty darn good. We had two in the top ten of the B race and with 60% in their first HS race, the season looks brighter than it has in years.

On the boys side, we had our top two in the A Race, we where they started off the race in the back half of the pack. By the time the race was over they had chomped their way through most of the field to place sixth and ninth, exactly as planned. The rest of the boys, nine in all, made a decent display in the B Race. Four Mascenic jerseys in the top ten; two of those four are only freshmen, no arguments here. In ten weeks we’ll get to see how much growth the seeds planted this week have grown, and with any luck, the roots will reach deep enough that success will burst forth right when we’re looking for it.

Briana Boulerice – Mascenic XC Captain

Coe-Brown Boys XC: Summer and Week 1

This is the best summer of training that I’ve had in my four years of high school. I don’t mean this in the sense of how hard I trained, although that was a huge factor, but rather in the sense of it was the most fun I’ve had while training. I rarely ran alone because my teammates and I met up four to five times a week to run together. We got to know each other better as people and runners, and also pushed each other to become the best we could be.  Sometimes this meant getting up as early as seven in the morning or other times running as late as eleven at night. Either way, the Coe-Brown boys found a way to get in the work.

There are a few runs in particular that stand out in my mind from this past summer. One night we decided we were going to get together and run up a mountain. We all met at the bottom at 11:30 PM with head lamps ready and took off. This was one of the most fun runs I’ve ever been a part of and I was really happy I got to share the memory with my teammates. Another run we did as a team was a race in Northwood called the Harmony Hill Race Series in which we all ran in American flag shorts with our coaches.  Overall it was just a fun summer of training and I’m very appreciative to my teammates who made it that way.

Last week we began our official cross country practices. The first week went well, despite temperatures jumping up into the high 80’s. I was excited to see lots of new faces beginning their high school running career and the determined faces of veterans ready to improve off of last year. I especially noticed the determination of the varsity boys.  We had one fartlek workout last week and besides that, easier recovery runs.

This week we have two workouts coming up, a tempo run and hill repeats. It’s the first hard week of training we’ll be having in a hopefully very long season. The team looks good and today the varsity boys run was 21 strong plus a few coaches. It’s great seeing the progression of lots of younger guys who want to make an impact on both the JV and varsity scene.

Before our run today we had a meeting with both the JV and varsity teams without any coaches. We discussed our goals and what we have to do in order to achieve them. It was good team bonding and it was great to hear that we’re all on the same page as a team.

Lastly as we approach the first meets in the upcoming weeks I’d like to wish all of my fellow athletes in NH the best of luck in the upcoming season. I hope your summer of training was as good as mine and all your seasons go well.

-Jared Nelson, Coe-Brown senior