New Runners! Welcome to Our Team!

 

Hello and welcome to Hughson Cross Country.  I hope you will have a great time with us, make lifelong friends, and learn how far you can push yourselves.  We work hard, but we have fun and I don't ask anyone to give anything more than they are capable of.

Here's What You Need

1. You need to be cleared.  This means you need a physical and you have to fill some stuff out online.  See this older blog post about how to do that.  
2. Good Running Shoes
3. Loose Fitting, Light Colored Clothing
4. Re-Usable Water Bottle With YOUR NAME ON IT
5. A healthy snack for immediately after (fruit, granola bar, etc...)
6. A GOOD ATTITUDE!

Other Helpful Stuff

• Please visit our page for Newbies and Parents.  Many of your questions can be answered here. 
• Take a look at the Nutrition Page and examine the "Power Back Diet" outlined on the page. 

Week 1 Schedule

Let's Get Ready for Week 1

Hi Team.  

Time to talk about our schedule for the first week of practice.  Since we will not have school this first week, this is a great opportunity for our experienced athletes to DOUBLE.  This will be the last opportunity for a while for our big dogs to put in a solid block of high volume training.  

• If you have been consistently running over 25 miles per week, you should double.  
• If you are experienced but coming off an injury, you should still come to both daily practices but cross train in the afternoon
• If you are a new runner who is not yet comfortable at 25 miles per week, you should come to only afternoon practices.

Practices will be held at 7:00 AM and 3:00 PM.  Please see the practice schedule below.  

Mon - 8/2:  Athletes run on your own.  We will start practice on Tuesday 8/3

Tue - 8/3: AM.  Warm up, 6 minute test, 2-4 miles easy coold down.

Tue - 8/3: PM. Easy shake out run + weights (advanced), intro drills, easy jog as able, core, weights (new)

Wed - 8/4: AM 40-60 minutes easy run, 

Wed - 8/4: PM: Wickets, dots, shake out run (advanced) Wickets, Dots, cone drills (new)

Thu - 8/5: AM: Core, PU, Lunges, 10-12 x 300-400 @ 95% vVO2 max, CD.

Thu - 8/5: PM: Easy Shake out + weights (advanced).  20 min easy jog + weights (new)

Fri -  8/6: AM: 40-60 min run 

Fri - 8/6: PM: Wickets, Dots, Easy shake out run (advanced). Wickets, Dots, 6 minute test (new)

Sat - Sun: Easy mileage as able.  Big dogs go long on Saturday

Mon 8/9: AM: Warm up, 30 minutes tempo, 4 x 200, Cool down, Weights

Mon 8/9: PM: Easy Shake Out (advanced)  6-10 x 200-300 (new)

Here's What You Need

1. You need to be cleared.  This means you need a physical and you have to fill some stuff out online.  See this older blog post about how to do that.  
2. Good Running Shoes
3. Loose Fitting, Light Colored Clothing
4. Re-Usable Water Bottle With YOUR NAME ON IT
5. A healthy snack for immediately after (fruit, granola bar, etc...)
6. A GOOD ATTITUDE!

Camp Stuff

 OK Team.  We're almost ready to go. 

• If you need to take your second Covid Test, make sure you are at the school by 8:00 AM
• We will need a number of coolers to store food in for the journey up the hill..  If you have one, please write your name on it and drop it off at the school at 8:00 AM on Monday.  If I don't end up needing it, I'll give it back on Tuesday.
• Please check the Camp Check List  to ensure that all of your documents are in order.
• If you still need a physical / athletic clearance....Romeo Medical Clinic in Turlock is good about making same day appointments. If you need help with the athleticclearance.com website, please let me know 

Looking forward to a great trip that helps our team become great!  If you are not going to camp....

• These next 2 weeks are important that you continue to build on the fitness gains you've already made this summer.  Continue with a high volume of mostly easy running with one day of tempo, one long day, and one day of speed development
• Call up some of your new homies on the team and make a running date!

First day of official practice is Tuesday,  August 3rd.  Veterans will practice twice daily from the 3rd to the 6th.  Newbies will practice once daily.  Practice times will be 

• 7:00 AM (Veterans Only)
• 2:30 PM (All Athletes)

Let's not forget those physicals

 

Don't Be Like J.R. 

Every Dang Year!

Hey team.  Just thought a little humor might help you remember that we need to get our physicals before the first day of practice on August 2nd.  

If you're going to camp, you need to have your physical on file before we leave.  

Here's a link to our athletic physical form

• Download the form
• Print It.
• Take it to your doctor when you get your physical.  
• Fill out the rest of the info on the form.
• Renew your Athletic Clearance account and upload a picture of the physical 

If you've never created an athletic clearance account, here are the directions.

 

Summer 2021

 

Time to Get Back To Basics

OK team.  Over the past year, we've let a lot of things slip.  The most important thing we've lost is the institutional knowledge of how to be serious about what we're doing and still have fun at the same time.  A number of you have begun to think it's OK to NOT PAY ATTENTION to important instructions or interrupt me or your teammates when we're making legtimate points.

This will stop now.  

The things that have made this team so special over the past 5-6 years are:

1. Our attention to a positive team culture where everyone shows everyone else respect
2. Our ability to find joy in doing the training necessary to reach the level of succes to which we've become accustomed.  

If you cannot do the two things above, or if you think that whatever you have to say is so important that you can ignore me or your teammates to have some sort of lame side conversation during team meetings, you do not need to be on this team.  

Summer Training Makes Fall Champions

We used to have shirts with the above slogan printed on them.  I've gone away from talking about championships in the past.  I'd rather learn to LOVE THE PROCESS than continuously talk about winning titles as if that is the only goal worth having.  

That being said, my teams have won more titles during my time at HHS than all the other sports put together.  If you love the process, love your teammates and treat them with respect, I promise you that you will find success.

Let's take a look at the summer training on this spreadsheet

• The primary stimulus is the main effort of the week.  You will certainly need an easy day after this day.  
• The secondary stimulus is a session that will be challenging, but not as draining as the primary stimulus.
• The speed development day should feel relatively easy and you should be able to go hard the next day. 

Summer Schedule

I understand that not all of you will make all of our practices.  You will travel with your families, work, or potentially have summer school.  The beauty of distance running is that if you are motivated and enjoy the process, you can train effectively on your own.  David McKay spent the summer of 2003 in the Netherlands with his mom's family and came back to win the TVL opener, the TVL Championship, and place 3rd in the Sac Joaquin Section.

That being said.  Summer running is usually easier and more fun when you do it with teammates.  So, here's our schdule

June: 14th, 16th, 17th, 21st, 23rd, 24th, 28th, 30th, 

July: 1st, 5th, 7th, 8th, 12th, 14th, 15th, 

Camp will run from July 19th to July 24th at Twin Bridges, CA  The top 7 boys and top 7 girls from the summer program will be invited to make the trip to camp.  Those who do not make the trip to camp enter the 2 week black out period where we don't have team practices.  

Official day one of practice begins on August 2nd.  School begins August 9th.  

Summer mileage begins June 7th and ends September 14th. 

What do the Best Teams Do? 

It's super easy to find out the answer to that question these days.  The internet is a wonderful tool for learning and sharing information about our sport.  Take a look at the video below to get an idea of how the top 2 teams in the United States prepared for the 2019 season.  

TVL/SAL Meet #1

FINALLY 

After months of on again, off again practice, school and training, we've finally got a REAL CROSS COUNTRY MEET under our belts!

Hughson Boys Lead the JV Pack

The Stanislaus County members of the Southern League and Trans Valley League met up at Diblo Grande for our first of 3 meets this year.  Hughson showed off the fitness we've been slowly developing over the last year by winning every division: JV Boys, JV girls, Varsity Boys, and Varsity Girls.  

Our JV boys were led by Ezra Arambula and Hudson Conners, who both set 2 mile PRs of 12:05.  Ezra and Hudson were pushed early on by Logan Prescott of Denair, but eventually pulled away to win by 46 seconds.  

Conners and Arambula lead Prescott just prior to the 1 mile mark

Our JV girls were led by Maggie Scarioni and Julie Parks, who also both set PRs on the day.  

Julie, Maggie and Jocelyn lead the JV girls

In the Varsity Boys race, Joe Lighthall led 9 Hughson runners into the top 12 overall.  Joe was joined early by Evan Espinoza, a 4:47 miler from Waterford High.  Eventually Lighthall pulled away to win by 40 seconds, while Espinoza was overtaken by Brian Campos of Hughson for second. 

Lighthall and Espinoza approaching the mile mark. 

The varsity girls race was the one competition where we did not have the individual race winner, as 2 tough runners from Waterford, Carmen Figueroa and Monica Gutierrez, led from start to finish.  However, our girls packed well, taking places 3-7 to easily win the team competition. A resurgant Camille Haupt led our girls, in the absensce of normal #1 runner Taylor Scheuber, who was nursing a lower leg injury.

Camille (1205) leads our girls' pack

It was very gratifying to see our kids experience the success that comes from persevering through challenging circumstances.  I'm very proud of this group. GO HUSKIES!

MEET RESULTS

A full recap of all the Stanislaus Country Cross Country action can be found at the StanCo Blog

HHS Team Store

 Hey Guys! Our Team Store is up and running. 

These items are 35% off the list price and a portion of each sale goes back to the team