Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Interview with Frosh Tom Burke

At the first meet of the year freshman Tom Burke placed 1st for W&M in 25:59 for 8K and 21st overall. In high school he was 6th at the Minnesota State XC meet and has run 4:14.80 for 1600m and 9:11.36 for 3200m. What follows is a quick interview he gave about his early experiences at W&M.

Q. What kind of mileage did you do during xc in high school? And this season?
A. In high school, I ran about 70 miles per week. The most I ever got up to was around 75. Usually this was with 2 or 3 doubles per week. This season my milage has consistently been around 80 miles. I haven't done any doubles. Read More.
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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Q. What has been the biggest change so far (other than 8k distance) from high school?
A. The length of the workouts has been the biggest change for me so far at college. We warm up and cool down for 6 miles total. Then we've been doing longer fartleks that have been around 8 miles. Also coach Gibby doesn't tell us what our workouts are going to be for the week. He tells us right before what we are going to do.

Q. How have you adjusted to no longer being the best runner on the team?
A. It's been a relatively smooth transition. I'm trying to be more patient in workouts to try and find where I fit on the team. I know I'm not going to be at my best every day so I'm just trying to stay consistent with my efforts.

Q. Why did you choose WM? What were some of the other schools that you seriously considered?
A. I chose W&M because of its combination of athletics and academics. I was interested in potentially majoring in history or government, and this school is known for those departments. Also I really liked the guys on the team and coach Gibby. I felt that I could fit in here well. The other school that I was seriously considering was Notre Dame. At my high school, one of our assistant coaches was Luke Watson, who is now the assistant coach at ND. It was a really tough decision, but I felt that I would have a better overall college experience at WM.

Q. How fast did you go out at the mile in the first race? What pace did you used to go out in your 5k races in high school?
A. At UVA we actually did the first 3 miles as a tempo run and ran the last 2 miles all out. My first mile was about 5:20. In high school, I typically went out in around 4:50, but some of the bigger invitational meets I went out a little quicker.

September 26, 2007 at 9:12 PM

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