Last Seasons

                As I was saying in my last blog post, my track season this year has officially come to an end and I plan to take a week off before starting to train for my cross country season. The end of this track season is kind of a big deal to me because I am a junior this year so now I only have one high school track season left, ever. I also only have one cross country season left in my high school career and it is kind of scary to think that my years running cross country and track will be over soon.

                Next year is not only my last season of high school track and cross country but it also may be my last seasons of running cross country and track in general. I really enjoy cross country and track, they are one of my most favorite parts of high school and I will really miss them. It would be nice to be able to continue running cross country and track but I don’t think that is going to work out for me.

                College track and cross country is much more challenging then high school in most cases and also much more time consuming. I also am not a very good runner so I probably won’t be able to actually be a part of a college track or high school team not them I am too disappointed by that because there are some other things that I will probably want to focus more on in college then track and cross country and I don’t think I am that dedicated to the sports to continue in college.  

                While it may not really be an option for me to run as part of a college cross country or track team I would still like to continue to run at least on my own when I am in college. I still really enjoy running and don’t want to completely give it up so I think I would still want to continue my running in college and if possible maybe even join some type of running club in college.

                I am really sad that next year is my last season of high school cross country and track because I enjoy the sports so much and there is still so much that I hoped to accomplished in the sports that I am yet to accomplish. I hope that I am able to also enjoy my last seasons in high school and I want to continue to run even when I graduate. (428)

State Qualifiers

                This Thursday, Friday and Saturday are the days of the state track meet. The state track meet is a big deal for all of the track athletes because it is one of the main events that we train all season for. This year I was not able to qualify for state but am very proud of all the members on my team that qualified. This year my track team qualified in thirteen different event.

                My track team has been able to improve a lot over the season to enable us to actually qualify a lot of our members for state.  At the beginning of the year many of the events on our team didn’t look very promising for qualifying for state but we were able to improve a lot and qualify in more than expected. I think we qualified in more events my freshman and sophomore year but many of those events included the upperclassman who all graduated and this year our team had more underclassman runners then we had upperclassman runners so it took a while for the freshman to get adjusted to high school track but once they were able to they improved. As a result of the underclassman improving it helped our whole team improve and we were able to qualify in a lot of events.

                State track and the Drake Relays are the biggest meets in high school track and along with conference and district they are the most important meets and are the ones that we prepare and practice for all season. While my team had a lot of events qualify for state we probably won’t score very many points at state. One of our main focuses this year at the state qualifying meet was making sure that we qualified in as many events as possible because we know that we probably won’t be able to score many points at state so we weren’t really concerned about stacking our relays to make sure we score the most points. We have a pretty good chance of scoring points in the 3000 and the 100 because only the top eight score at state. Other than that we probably won’t score in many other events but my team is just happy to be able to run as many events as we are at state. (386)

Weeks

                I should ideally be running most of the 365 days in a year but in reality I tend to take a lot of breaks during the winter and I also take the weekends off a lot too. Track season just ended for me on Friday and now I also plan to take another week break before I start my running again for this summer and for training for cross country season.

                I should be running every week in the year with the exception of the week after track season and the week after cross country season. Cross country and track season don’t allow for a lot of breaks in your running and so really the only ideal time to be able to take a week off of running is after your season.  I need to run in the summer because those are the weeks leading up to cross country season and I also need to run in the winter because those are the weeks leading up to my track season. I also obviously need to run in the spring and the fall because those are the weeks in which I am actually in my cross country or track season. Since that means that I normally end up needing to run every week of the year it is nice to take a week off of running after each of my seasons.

                Even though I should be running every week of the year except for two I normally don’t run every single day of the week and I find myself taking off more days then I really should. In the winter I take off a lot of days because it is normally way too cold to run outside and it can get really boring running the same thing every day on the treadmill. I also will take a few days off in the summer because sometimes it is way too hot outside to run or I am on vacation and don’t fell like running very much.

                This week is the week after my track season so it is one of the few weeks in a year when I actually take every day off of running, seven days in a row. Other than that I try to run every week because I have to prepare for or am in my cross country or track season.  I really need to take this break each year because it can get a little tiring to run most days of every week. I’m sure this week will fly by and be over before I know it.  (429)

Relays

                In a track meet the athletes can either run in individual events or in relay events. Individual events end to have less pressure than relays because if you have a bad race that effects your performance it mainly only effects how you perform but if you are on a relay team and you have a bad race it effects how the whole relay team performs.

                I have had to run many more relay events this year than I have ran individual events. I am mainly a four hundred meter runner and have only really ran the open four this year, the four by four, the distance medley relay and the sprint medley relay. I find the relays to put much more pressure on me than the individual events.

                In individual events I still want to perform my best and try my hardest in order to be able to score some points in the meet for my team but it doesn’t put as much pressure on me as relays. In relays I still want to try hardest and score points in the meet for my team but if I have a bad race or mess up it effects my whole relay. In individual races if I mess up I can really only blame myself but in relays if I mess up or someone else messes up and we don’t place well people on your relay may blame you.

                If you run a bad leg in your relay it could also affect how the people after you run. If you hand off the baton in last it can be harder for the next person to compete with the other runners and run their best times if they are really far behind. It can also be pressuring if you are anchoring the relay because you don’t want to let your team own by having people pass you and finishing in a place lower than the one you were in when you got the handoff.

                A track meet has both individual events and relays. Both can be enjoyable to run in but relays can sometimes put more pressure on a runner because there are more people depending on you to run your best so your whole relay can succeed. (375)

 

 

Running on Vacation

Each summer I normally go on a few vacations. In the summer I also need to run as often as possible in preparation for the approaching track season. I have to run during the summer in order to get in shape and to get faster by the start of the cross country season. Running every day during the summer can become kind of a drag and hard to continue to do but it is especially hard to keep up my running when I am on vacation.

While I enjoy running for the most part it can be really hard to make myself run during the summer. In the summer I normally just want to relax and hang out with my friends so running each day can be a challenge and I normally only actually end up running five out of the seven days in a week. During vacation it becomes even more of a challenge to make myself run during the week.

Each year after the fourth of July my family normally goes on vacation to Minnesota where we stay in cabins by a lake. We swim, fish, go boating, go tubing and skiing and we relax on the beach. I love going to Minnesota and staying in the cabins and look forward to it each year because it is so much fun. When I am laying on the beach in Minnesota or even just relaxing by doing nothing the last thing that I want to do is go on a run but I always know that I need to at least run a few days on my vacation to stay in shape and in order to not make all my previous training a waste by taking a week off and having to start all over again.

It is always important for me to make sure that I continue my summer running through my vacation even if I don’t really want to. I need to make sure that I am running so that I am in shape for cross country season and can improve my times during cross country season. It is hard for me to run on vacation because I just want to relax but I always know that I really need to run and my sisters and my dad also help remind me that I need to make sure I am running and so they help to motivate my running during vacation. (404)

Districts

                Thursday is the day of districts or the state qualifying meet for track and field. If you want to run at state Thursday is your only chance to qualify. A week after that on Thursday, Friday and Saturday is when the state meet takes place.

                One way to guarantee your qualification to state is by placing first or second in your event at the districts meet. In every district the first two places go to state and after that they take the next twelve fastest runners. So even if you place third at districts or eve n sometimes fifth or sixth you can still qualify for state if your time is fast enough and you were just in a very fast district for that event.

                This year in my district we are competing against Clinton, Washington, Dubuque, Prairie, Iowa City High and Iowa City West. This year districts is looking very competitive in all of the field events. Many of the top twenty ranked athletes who do field events are in our district and based on the standings as of now form the year ten people could make it to state in discus.

                Last year we had people qualify in most events except for a few but this year we have lost a lot of athletes that qualified last year so it will be much more difficult for our team to have someone qualify in most of the events but it is still very possible. One thing that my team really needs to work on in order to qualify would be improving our handoffs. Lately a lot of our handoffs in relays have been costing us few seconds and if my team is able to perfect them by the state qualifying meet and they are able to drop a few seconds they can greatly improve their chance of qualifying for state especially in the four by one and the four by two hundred meter relays.

                The state qualifying meet is on Thursday and my team still needs to work on a few things to qualify like handoffs. Having only one chance to qualify can be very stressful and pressuring. If you mess up your handoff or our even just having an off day you could jeopardize your chance of going to state. Last year we had a teammate who was ranked high in long jump and had a very good chance of qualifying but she ended up scratching on all of her jumps and didn’t make it. Hopefully everyone on my team is able to perform their best this year at districts and we have many of our events qualify. (440)

State Track

               State track will be in a few weeks. I am very excited if I am able actually able to qualify for state. I have gone to state track for the last two years as an alternate and I am hoping that I will at least be able to go to state as an alternate again this year but I would really like to actually qualify or be on a relay team that qualifies so I can run at the state meet.

                This week we have a junior varsity meet on Monday then a varsity meet on Thursday. Next week we have are conference meet on Thursday and then are state qualifying meet the following week. After that we only have state and then the season will be over. This season has seemed to go by really fast especially considering many of our meets have been cancelled this season because of the weather. I will be really sad to see this season come to an end because after that I only have one high school track season left.

                Since my season is almost over I want to be able to end the season on a good note and one way to do that is to qualify for state. My freshman year I was an alternate in the 4 by 800 and my sophomore year I qualified in the 4 by 100 and the distance medley. This year I would actually like to qualify and run at state. If I were to qualify for state I would probably qualify in an event in which I run a four hundred because that’s the only thing that I have been running all year.

                I would really like to qualify for state because I think it would be really cool to be able to run at state and I have really enjoyed going to state in the past. State track lasts for three days and we get to stay in a hotel with the track team. It would also be great to qualify because I have been working hard and training all year for all my meets and so I could go to state and it would suck to be unable to go after all the training I’ve down but if I am unable to go this year then I will just have to work really hard in the next year so I have a chance to qualify next season. (405)