Week 7
Week 7 started off with a workout. After not seeing the results we necessarily wanted at Manchester, we worked to stay focused and kick it into high gear this week. We did a 500s workout, starting with a 15 minute warm up, doing d-flex, and then started. Runners had the option to do 6-8 of them, with a 1:1 fast to recovery ratio. We put in a hard workout, making sure to emphasize staying on pace and working together, as being a pack is our strong suit. Additionally, the weather started to get cooler and less humid, making the workout more bearable, and slightly less sweaty, than before (still not fun). We did a debrief of Manchester, then were sent on a 15 minute cool down. A focused, steady workout created a good start to our week.(if you say so)
Tuesday brought another long run, though not as long as the last. (Is it still a long run if you’ve done longer runs?) The options were 60 or 70 minutes, but most people went out for 70. I can’t speak for what anyone else did, but I know that the group I was in ran to Greenville, the neighboring town, and back. When you run on the trails in the woods, you hardly ever know where you are, much less others, so running into anyone is like wild if you know what I mean. Like when you travel to Utah for vacation and run into a schoolmate you don’t like on a hiking trail wild. So when we passed Kelson on the housing development we were kinda confused and really awkward. I’m sure he was too… Lol.
Wednesday brought the notorious Grinder. We had run it 2 ½ weeks prior, and were ready to face it again, in hopes of improvement. Everyone prepared mentally and physically (mostly
mentally) to improve their time, and the results did not disappoint(sure…). Both Drew Traffie and Skye Lambert ran fast enough, under 8 minutes on the boys side and under 10 minutes on the girls side, to be granted t-shirts. In our previous run up the Grinder, Drew came in at a heartbreaking (lol) 8:01, only 2 seconds from a t-shirt (what a loser), but ended up running 7:57 this time. Skye had previously run 10:17, and ended up taking an incredible 30 seconds off her time. Everyone else improved drastically as well, with our coach stating that this was the best overall Grinder improvement he had seen. After the Grinder, everyone ran more mileage and ended the day on a good note.(“Ran more miles” we went on a “group run” with the entire team, both boys and girls and it was really fun. We talked a bit, and joked alot. We may have kinda made fun of some people… but like they kinda deserved it. It was fun :))
On Thursday, we had race prep for the Belmont Invitational. Our coach talked with us for a bit (much more than a bit) about our game plan for the next day(it literally was forever). We went on an easy run for 30 minutes, then did 5 starts in the baseball field. After the starts, we did (attempted to do) yoga walks and then ran for another 10 minutes.
On Friday, we hiked up to Belmont for the Belmont Invitational. We had raced there 2 weeks prior, and this time hoped for better results. As there were more teams here than last time, this race could give us a good look at where we stood in our division. After putting in focused(ish) training this week at practice, we all looked to continue that into our race. We ran in the comfortable weather with discombobulated(lol that’s one way to describe it) uniforms, but ended up competing well. Out of 16 teams, our girls ended up coming in 3rd and our boys came in 2nd, which was decent results given the teams we were competing against. We saw our girl’s strength, “the pack” come into play again, which definitely helped improve our score. On the bus ride back, we stopped at Hannafords, played Beanboozled(almost threw up), and made funny judgments of others(we bullied them), as we were all tired and filled with adrenaline.
Week 8
On Monday, we had an 800s workout on our XC course. It was very rainy, muddy, and slippery in our workout area, with a fight against the clock due to a middle school meet, but we made the best of it. We all worked to improve from our last 800s workout, mainly trying to complete more reps, as well as working on consistency and rhythm.(Running over middle schoolers really throws off your rhythm, fun fact.) All our runners did a 10 minute warm up, strides, 5-8 reps of the 800s, and a 15 minute cool down. As the weather never makes for a dull moment in practice, afterwards we were very soggy and muddy, but still proud of the workout we put in nonetheless.
On Tuesday, we did race prep in order to be ready for the Cougar Classic at Derryfield School. As our course wasn’t suitable for our typical starts after heavy rain the previous day, we did a 40 minute run and strides instead. It made for a relatively quick practice, but a meaningful one nonetheless.
On Wednesday, we went to Derryfield School to run the Cougar Classic. The weather was decent and the course was in good shape, making the race look promising. Overall, our girls didn’t have their strongest race, but we still placed 2nd out of 5 teams, with Hopkinton beating us. Our boys did pretty well, and came in 1st, with two of our boys coming in the top five, and earning themselves some pumpkins. The highlight though was rolling down the hill behind the dugout, trying (unsuccessfully) not to run into each other. After the race, we stopped at Hannafords, and had a talkative bus ride back.
On Thursday, we did 300s up on the track. Normally we wouldn’t do a workout right after a race but we were going to get Friday off so we did the workout Thursday. We started with a warm up and d-flex. We ran 300m ten times with an equal amount of recovery around the softball field. We did our best to stay consistent during the workout, and most people had a great workout. We finished with our d-flex and then did a nice cool down. The smell of fall was starting to get in the air, so it was very nice, especially after a warm September.
Friday was a teacher workshop day, and we didn’t have school, so we didn’t have practice. Some people still went out on their daily run (I was not one of those people, while the rest, the not crazy ones, enjoyed the day off. 🙂
