New Nutrition Page

I don't know why this isn't showing up in the "pages bar" but here is a bunch of stuff about nutrition, perhaps our most overlooked part of this sport.

Nutrition Page

Camp Photos

We had a great camp up at the Brooks' cabin near Lake Tahoe.  Everybody ran really strong.  Enjoy the photos

The Start of Practice Approaches

OK.  Camp is done and was great!....Special thanks to Dawson and Marina for all the help.  Now, down to business.

1. Get your physicals taken care of! You cannot practice with the team until you have your physical complete and the paperwork from the office complete.
2. Continue running.  We have 2 weeks, actually 16 days from the end of camp to the start of practice.  If you sit on your butt during that time, you will lose much of what you have gained during the summer. 
3. This should be your highest volume reached for the entire summer, or even the season.  If you are doing the program right, you may touch this mileage once or twice during the season, but you won't sustain anything at that level.

For the next two weeks, your mileage should look like this 

• 50-65 mpw: Austin, Daniel
• 45-55 mpw: Tristan, Michael, Jared, Wyatt
• 40-50 mpw: Maddy, Dalton, Garrett, Jesus, Corbin, Jackson
• 25-35 mpw: Mason, Nick, Timmy, Mark B, Mark H, Greg
• 15-25 mpw: Gaby, Priscilla, Heavyn

If you follow through with this, your summer will have peaked with your 3 biggest weeks ever. We will then take a cut back week where mileage decreases to about 65-70% of the previous 3 weeks.  You guys will need it.  You'll be adjusting to afternoon training and getting back into the swing of school.

I plan to post an outline of the training schedule for our top group of athletes.  Most of you will follow this general format, but do less volume and less intensity.  I should have this up in a couple of days.

Thursday Practice Very Good

We had one of our better practices of the summer last night.  This is what made it good:

1. We had a good number of people there.  We didn't have everybody....fair, family trips, and what not took their normal summer toll, but we had a good group yesterday.  Keep this up.  Hold Each Other Accountable!
2. The intensity level and volume of training were good.  I don't think anyone left yesterday's workout thinking that they were totally wasted, yet at the same time, we all had a good training session and achieved the goal of the workout, which was to get a fair amount of volume and to have our legs do some easy turnover work.

We have to remember one thing all summer and most of the fall. Steady volume of miles is the most important factor in our training.  However, the training should be as low stress as possible while still achieving the training goal. Let me offer some suggestions on how yesterday's workout could have been improved. I will use the varsity boys workout as an example.

• VB squad did 5 miles easy followed by 16x200 @ 2 mile race pace with full recovery between reps. The weather was pretty warm, but the heat wasn't that bad.  None the less, you still spent well over 1 hour training in temps in the 90 degree range.  The workout totaled 7 miles

1. A better scenario would have seen the whole varsity team do what Daniel did....run an easy 4 miles in the morning, so that he could do a little less volume in the heat of the evening.  Daniel totaled 9 miles for the day
2. The best scenario would have been for the whole varsity squad to meet and run 5-6 miles easy in the morning then have the evening workout be dedicated totally to the 16x200 workout.  6 miles in the morning with an evening workout of 1 mile warm up, 16x200, 1 mile cool down would have given 10 miles for the day, but probably felt less stressful than the workout that the team actually completed.  A scenario such as that would have accomplished the goals of 1. Get good volume and 2. Have the legs turn over at race pace in a non stressful situation.
3. Let me continue to stress that fact that you guys should be doubling as much as possible.  The best days to double are the days we have practice.  If you double on the days we have practice, then the practices out in the heat of the evening will be shorter and more focused.  If you don't double, then the evening practices have to be longer. 

Don't get me wrong.  I was very pleased with the workout yesterday.  I think that all levels got benefit from the session, from our newest beginners to our top varsity athletes.  Let us continue to work to improve.

I'd like to link you to This Interview With Former State Champion, Paul Thomas of Jesuit High. Paul offers some very good advice for up and coming runners.  One of the best pieces of advice he gives is to "live like a clock". That means be precise.  Wake up on time, do your running, sleep plenty, eat well, be consistent....live like a clock.

Summer Mileage Update

Ok, we are 5 weeks into the summer.

Some of you have been running and submitting mileage and coming to practice and showing good progress
Some of you have been doing combinations of the above three things
Some of you have been doing none of the above 3 things.

We are moving into July. This is perhaps the most important month of the summer. We can really have a big month now, then go a bit easier in August when we begin running after school in the hot hot afternoons. This means that our legs will be feeling pretty good when it is time to race at the end of August and the beginning of September.

Remember a big July is the stepping stone to a great season.

Summer Mileage Through Week 5

If you have not gotten your mileage to me recently, please do so ASAP.

Atwater "Run For Independence" July 4th, 2014

Austin and Daniel traveled down to Atwater for the annual "Run For Independence" 5 mile race.  Both came away with good results.  Despite doing a fairly hard workout only 12 hours prior, the 2 boys put up our best times ever at this race.

Austin was 2nd in his age group and 6th overall with a time of 30:33
Daniel was 3rd in the age group and 7th overall with at time of 30:35.

Usually, a good result for us on the 4th of July is a time somewhere in the 32-33 minute range, considering the heat and the fact that at this point of the summer, we really haven't gotten back to any serious training.  Daniel and Austin are our mileage leaders for the summer and the fact that they have been hitting the roads showed up in their good performance.

Good Job Guys!  Don't get too excited, we still have a long way to go, but keep up the good work.