9/16 News and Notes

The Week in Review

Last week we got in a full slate of practice uninterrupted by heat or meet.  That included some 1000m repeats at race-pace on Tuesday to simulate the Arcadia Valley course.  Then on Wednesday as we recovered, we got in a very competitive soccer match, with teams captained by our two juniors girls on the soccer team last spring.  After a back-and-forth battle that kept Reese very busy in goal, Jocelyn's team scored to defeat Sybina's team 3-2.

Thursday the team gathered for our pasta (and panini dinner).  We are incredibly grateful to Jason King at Fuel Cafe for hosting us.  Secret Hitler made an appearance, and even without Jackson there to stir up the intensity, the game still got plenty wild.

Arcadia Valley Recap

After two hot races, Arcadia Valley offered some relief.  Friday's rain made the course a bit damp, but the cooler weather more than made up for any mud.  This year's course had slightly wider starting boxes where runners could at least go two-wide.  To accomplish this, the starting line was pushed back, which ultimately pushed the finish line forward and much closer to the final turn. 

I'm going to trust that these changes balanced out to preserve a race distance close enough to 5000m.  What I'm not as confident of is that the mile markers moved accordingly.  The splits for the second mile were incredibly long, even considering how much many runners slow down after the first mile.  The first mile splits seemed reasonable.  It's a bit late to take a measuring wheel to the course, but based on the talk of other coaches and my own explorations on Google Earth, it appears the two-mile marker was roughly 100m further down the course than it should have been. 

I did my best to adjust the split times accordingly, but that's still a bit of voodoo math.  It also serves as the reminder I shared with our runners.  Cross country isn't track.  As much as we (that includes myself) get fixated on times, they might not mean nearly as much as we would like.  Presumably tracks are designed by engineers and built to specification.  They're all essentially the same oval.  Assuming a stagger start to accommodate for lane assignment, four laps is a mile.  That's the end of the story. 

High school cross country courses are a much different animal.  Few are permanent, meaning they must be remeasured and rebuilt every year, typically by coaches and volunteers.  They often end up short or long, and the mile markers between are sometimes more estimate than exact.  Even if a course is 5000m along the shortest path, pretty much every runner covers a greater distance than that.  So while we can glean some things from splits, we should always take them with a grain of salt.  In this case, that means focusing more on the numbers on the left end of the chart.

We were excited to see how our runners would perform on what will ultimately be our district course.  They didn't disappoint.  

The varsity boys kicked our team off.  We only ran three runners.  Carter ran a smart race and was able to chase down and pass Woodland's Calvin Layton--the top returning runner from our district--and take 1st in the small school division.  In the process, he dipped under 17 to set a new school record.  His time of 16:50 eclipsed the 17:01 run by Levi Krauss back in 2015.  

That performance set the tone for the day.  Ethan rode a strong kick across the finish line to get within a handful of seconds from dropping below 19, hitting the fourth fastest time of his career.  He grabbed the last medal in the small school division by finishing 20th.  Noah H. ran a controlled first mile and shaved nearly three and a half minutes off of his finish time from the home meet. ​

The varsity girls race brought more success.  After two challenging races to start the season, Reagan pushed through a strong last mile to finish second in the small school division.  Her time of 21:06 is the fastest by an SV girl at Arcadia Valley during the regular season.  It was also the second fastest time by a junior girl in program history, and the third fastest time overall. 

Abby finished 13th in the small school division to capture a medal, running the second-fastest regular season race of her career.  Audrey negative split her entire race, finishing more than 3 minutes faster than at last year's meet and setting a 90-second PR.  Kennedy also had a strong finish, also running the second-fastest regular season race of her career.  Sybina once again chased down a runner with a big lead over the last mile.  While she didn't quite win the footrace at the end and missed going sub-30 by one second, she still had a better pace for 3.1 miles than for 2 miles two weeks ago at Jackson.  She also ran the fastest regular season race of her career.  And Jocelyn hung tough with another runner over the last mile.  Her time was nearly two minutes faster than our home meet and better than any of her races last year.  

As the only Class 1 school in a field of mostly Class 4 and 5 schools, the girls team finished just behind Perryville.

We kept Noah W and the freshmen in the JV Boys race because they had the chance to compete (and maybe place) as a team.  They lived up to that possibility, taking 4th out of 13 teams.  Among small schools they were first, even beating teams who padded their JV squads with juniors and seniors.

That team performance was paced by Luke, who shaved more than 90 seconds off of his time from the home meet while taking 11th place in the combined field of small and large schools.  Cain, Caden, and Bo stuck together through the first two miles.  Cain crushed the last mile, but Caden and Bo finished close enough behind.  All three boys finished more than two minutes faster than at the home meet.  Noah W ran a smart and consistent race to finish with the fastest regular season race of his career.  And Tristin found a little motivation from a South Iron runner en route to a nearly 90 second improvement from his home meet time.

We had just two runners in the JV girls race.  Anna ran an incredibly disciplined race, working her way in front of a group of runners in the last mile to slide into the top 10.  That included beating out a Kelly runner at the finish line.  Her 9th place finish also bettered her time as the 9th fastest freshman in team history, placing her well within striking distance of some accomplished runners in our program.  Reese was the only runner from our team to run a first mile slower than her average pace.  That saved her the energy to crush the last mile and power through the final switchbacks to run her fastest time in nearly a year.

District Assignments Announced

Last Friday the state announced class and district assignments.  We already knew where we would be running, but now we know who will be at the starting line with us.  It's still early in the season.  Some schools have only completed one race.  Therefore my thoughts here are far from predictive.  Rankings--be they objectively time-based or subjectively expert-based--do not determine trophies and medals.  We run the races for a reason.

The raw placement for our school is Class 1, but given the points accumulated under the championship factor structure, our boys will run up a class for at least one more year.  Our district hasn't changed much from last year.  Looking at the three schools to qualify for state alongside of us in 2023, one can find plenty of familiar faces.  Despite losing their top runner in state champion Reed Layton, Woodland remains the heavy favorite, paced by his younger brother Calvin and senior Hayden VanGennip.  Puxico also still features their top two runners from last year in senior Logan Robison and junior Jett Hancock.  

We won't get to see St. Pius as much now that they are out of our conference.  However, their second and third best runners both transfered to Jefferson so they aren't as strong as last year.  They do return top runner Jayden Metzler and could remain a dark horse, and I expect them to improve as the season progresses.  With those transfers on the other hand, Jefferson got a lot better.  They now have four runners who have hit low 18s or faster, and freshman Karter Bradshaw isn't far behind.  That puts them right on the heels of Woodland.

The biggest development is East Carter moving back up to Class 2 and rejoining our boys district.  That also impacts the girls (more on that in a moment), but for our boys that means one more team joining a tough mix.  They are a young team.  Their top runner is sophomore Chayse Bradshaw, who's improved quite a bit from last year.  They have two more strong runners and two freshmen who will likely finish the season close to them.  There's not much depth behind that, but if they stay healthy I expect them to make some strides and a strong push for third.

Speaking of strides, a number of teams from last year have gotten older and faster.  Two in particular to keep an eye out for are Saxony and Kelly.  Saxony is a balanced team with a ton of depth.  They don't have any standout runners, but there's just two minutes separating their top 7.  Kelly's standout senior Truman White finished in the top 20 at Arcadia Valley, and behind him the team has four quality runners despite lacking much depth after that at this point.  A final team to keep an eye on is Campbell.  With no seniors in their top 5, I expect them to be a contender next year if not already this November.

All in all, there are 20 teams with enough boys to score.  I would say as many as 9 or 10 of them have a reasonable shot at the four state-qualifying spots at this point.  Our boys are definitely in that mix, but we have some work to do to make sure to get ahead of the rest.

For our girls the story is very different.  They will remain in Class 1 this year.  Many of these schools are small, some of them with fewer than 100 students.  Many also try to field volleyball and/or softball teams in the fall.  The growing struggle has been for these schools to find enough girls for a cross country program, let alone a scoring team.  The district has over 20 schools, but at this point only three of them have had at least five girls finish a race.

One of them is us.  Another is reigning district champion Dora.  That team had no seniors in their top seven and six runners earn all-district honors last year, including reigning champion Isabelle Martin. It's no surprise they are the favorite this year.  Last year they won by a tiebreaker with East Carter, who I mentioned moved to Class 2 and made a thin district even thinner.  Van Buren finished third last year.  They graduated two of their top five and haven't found much depth at this point to replace it.  I don't expect them to be as strong this year, but they still have top runner Ziah Been who anticipate near the front of the race at districts.  Last year Bernie snuck in front of us for the last ticket to state.  They also lost several seniors and only have three girls this year.

Beyond that the only other team with at least five girls on their roster is Bismarck, though only 3 of them have completed a race to this point.  If this situation had happened last year (and it did in District 3), we would be facing a tougher situation.  Previously the state's policy was that if only four teams scored at a district meet, then only the top three would advance to state.  Likewise, three scoring teams would only result in two advancing to state.  That would have sent us into a head-to-head duel with Van Buren for the second and final qualifying spot.  However, last winter the state dropped that policy.  If only three teams score, then all three will advance to state. 

That essentially amounts to an automatic ticket to state for our girls.  I'm not one to settle for handouts and coast to Columbia.  With enough work, our ladies have an outside chance of sneaking onto the podium at state.  That's where we'll be directing our training in the coming weeks.  

The Week Ahead

With no races and a day off school on Friday, this week will look a little different than the previous ones.  On Tuesday we will tackle what will likely be our only hill workout.  Wednesday will bring our last round of Pickleball.  Then on Thursday we will have some team bonding.  That will start with pizza and some support for our volleyball team.  I think our runners have some other shenanigans in store after that.  We'll close out the week Friday morning with a quality aerobic workout.

Our Upcoming Races

While we might not have a race this week, we'll more than make up for that afterwards.  In the two weeks that follow, we have three races in 10 days.  I shared last spring how one of the things we did right last year was limiting the number of races for our top runners, a point supported by the racing patterns of the top teams in the state.  

To ensure that this year, most of our runners will only be competing in two of the three races.  Our entire team will still attend each meet.  Those not racing will compete an aerobic workout at the course.  The breakdown of races is below.  The decisions were a mixture of runner preference, other teams in attendance, and making sure we had enough runners to score.