More on the NCAA XC MeetIf you missed Sean Anastasia-Murphy's audiocast of the NCAA race, you can hear it here. You can also see the entire race here. Finally redshirt frosh Patterson Wilhelm participated in his NCAA race and writes about it here.
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We just finished up the region meet and I thought we had a pretty strong performance. We finished up in 3rd place just 5 points out of first. It was tough to swallow that we ran really well yet still couldn’t quite get the auto bid (top 2) to the NCAA meet. Anyways, Christo led the team with a 4th place performance followed closely by Fitz in 6th. Massam was 15th, I was 23rd, and Mock closed out the top five with 26th place. Rob Dennis was 36th and Colin was 50th. I could tell everyone was pretty excited with how they ran considering we beat UVA which was going to give us the at-large bid into the NCAA meet! The race itself was a lot of fun. University of Louisville had a pep band out on the course playing music and it was a beautiful day. I felt pretty good on the warm up and really loosened up on my strides. The race itself went out pretty fast and never really slowed up. I found Massam early in the race and we were able to work together through some of the race. After the race we went back to the hotel and messed around in the pool. This was my first 10k and I learned a lot from it. Hopefully we can use this momentum through the next week and a half and run well at NCAA.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Thankfully our flight home was pretty uneventful besides the fact that we had to be up extremely early. When we got back to the burg everyone went for about a 4-6 mile run. In order to get the race out of our legs Gibby told us to run twice. After the run I went back to my place to watch my GREENBAY PACKERS play! A guy on the team is a big Vikings fan so it was nice to shut them out. I went out for my second run around 5. I ran about 4 miles and got a really good stretch in. My legs already feel better I’m just really tired from being up since 4 in the morning. The team had a Thanksgiving Dinner at the Hall tonight. It was nice seeing everyone again and eating lots of food.
Monday, November 12, 2007
We officially found out last night/today that we received an at-large bid to the NCAA meet! Today was a pretty low key practice. The guys going to the IC4A Championship had a workout whereas the rest of us just had a maintenance run. Obviously this week is dedicated to making sure we get the race out of our system and shift gears to the NCAA meet. I ran with Mock today on our typical Monday run. We had to modify it a little since we weren’t going our usually 10 miles. I ran for about 40 minutes today and felt really good. I did some barefoot strides out on Busch Field after my run to loosen things up a little bit more. We are working out on Tuesday and Friday going into the meet. 7 days.
Tuesday, November 12, 2007
I had a meeting with Gibby today to discuss what I thought about the regional race. We broke it down and figured out some things that I could adjust to be more effective in the meet on Monday. It was nice to sit down and break the race down and then forget about it. The regional race doesn’t mean anything now. The season basically just started. Gibby also gave me a little preview as to what the NCAA race would be like and we talked a little bit about tactics. He said we would talk more in-depth about it when the time gets closer. Anyways, at practice today we warmed up to the course. We knew today wasn’t going to be anything to involving. We are still trying to recover. We ran a 10 minute brisk run around the course then took 5 minutes off and did a 8 minute pace run. We did the brisk run together but we were told to do the pace run by ourselves. I think Gibby just wanted to make sure everybody was working at their own pace. I can tell everyone is getting really excited for the last race. Some of the guys on the team that won’t be racing at nationals are driving out there. We better not disappoint them. 6 days.
Wednesday, November 13, 2007
Again, today was a pretty laid back practice. Gibby told us to run a little longer today just to keep sharp. I ran 8 miles today and took an ice bath because my legs have still been a little sore from the race. 5 days.
Thursday, November 14, 2007
Last maintenance run in Williamsburg before the race. We had an easy 6 mile day. My legs are really starting to feel springy and I have been getting extremely excited about the race. I know it is still early but it’s hard to stop thinking about the race. It was a pretty nasty day so instead of getting into spikes and doing strides on Busch field we stayed in our trainers and did them on the turf. Tomorrow is our last workout of the year. Our flight leaves from Newport News at 12:30. We have to get up early tomorrow for practice. Gibby told us to be warmed up and ready to go at the track by 8:45. Tomorrow won’t be anything difficult it will just be something to sharpen us up a bit (i.e. something fast). 4 days.
Friday, November 15, 2007
Met Gibby at the track ready to go at 8:45. We started off in trainers and did a 6 minute brisk run around the track. It was just to wake us up since it was a little earlier than we were used too. After that we took about 3 minutes easy and lined up to do some pace run 1ks. Gibby wanted us to find 3:04-3:05 but of course since it was the first time on the track we went out a little quick. We ended up running 2:58 took a minute rest and did a second one in 3:02. Everybody felt pretty comfortable. Then we got into spikes and lined up for another 1k. He told us to run the first 400 in 70 and then change gears every 200 after that. We went out a little fast 68/69 and then picked it up every 200. It felt good to turnover a little. We ran 2:38 for the last 1k. That was the entire workout. All the work is done now. It was really exciting just knowing that the next hard effort I have will be the national meet. Anyways, we cooled down and got ready for the flight. Gibby almost took too long and was late picking us up. It’s the biggest meet of the year and our coach can’t even figure out how to use a clock, haha. Landed in Indy and ate dinner at Fazolis around 7. Everyone was pretty tired so we checked into our rooms and promptly went to bed around 11. 3 days
Saturday, November 16, 2007
We got up and ate breakfast at the hotel. None of us really wanted to do back to back runs at the course so Gibby found us a nice park to run at. The weather was beautiful—shirtless weather to run. After the 5 mile run we went and grabbed lunch at Quiznos. We didn’t have much planned for the rest of the day except for the NCAA banquet later that night. We pretty much lounged around our rooms for the entire day. We had our team meeting at 5 in Gibby’s room to discuss the race itself and some of our tactics. We just want to get out hard and set ourselves up well. Gibby told me to look to be anywhere from 80-130 at 5k and to keep moving up. After our team meeting we went to the banquet which was surprisingly a lot of fun. It was cool to see all of the other teams. Kait Hurley, who transferred from W&M to Wisconsin, came up to say hey to everyone. They gave out all of the regional runners’ of the year awards and stuff like that. It was held at ISU. On a side note, we got the results from the IC4A meet which some guys ran up in NY. The team ran pretty well and finished third! We drove back to the hotel and hung out for awhile then went to bed. 2 days.
Sunday, November 17, 2007
We got up and ate breakfast at the hotel once again. We headed over to the course to do our pre-race run there. It was exciting seeing all the other teams at the course and knowing that we have worked hard all season for this one race. We ran our 5 mile pre-race on the 8k course that we ran for the Pre-National meet. On the run we passed by the Baylor woman’s team and they were making bird noises at us. They kind of caught us off guard. Everyone said they felt pretty good. We did some strides and then took off. We went to Wal-Mart to get some lunch and some food for tomorrow. We basically had the entire day to ourselves which is always dangerous. I stayed in my room most of the day watching the GREENBAY PACKERS game! It was amazing. They destroyed Carolina. We had dinner tonight with some of the alumni including KEITH BECHTOL. It was so nice seeing him. He is a guy you truly miss having on your team. We had another team meeting tonight and had quick individual meetings with Gibby. I’m getting pretty nervous but trying to keep composed. It is just another race no biggy. Thankfully the race is tomorrow because I’m soooooo tired of sitting in this hotel room. 1 MORE DAY!
Monday, November 18, 2007
15th in the COUNTRY! just had to get that out. How did it all happen? WELL, we all got out pretty well. I was in contact with Christo and Fitz through at least 2k. The race itself, however, went out pretty slow. At 5k I was 15 seconds behind those guys. It was nice because I found Massam again but we couldn’t quite move up like we did at the regional race. I kept my breathing under control the entire race though. I felt pretty good at 5k and then started to catch a little cramp around 6k. I recovered though and started to try and move up. It was such an intense race. People were screaming at you the entire time and trying to tell you what to do. Anyways, I closed pretty well and passed some people right before the line. I finished 123rd overall, 97th for team scoring and second for our team. Fitz caught a cramp around 7k and couldn’t recover. I felt terrible for him because he worked way too hard all season to catch some bad luck at his last race. Anyways, biggest news of the day would of course have to be that CHRISTO WAS 13th IN THE COUNTRY. Everyone was so excited for him. He really did his part. We had a solid pack of our 2-6 right around each other. After looking at the team score it is tough knowing that we should have done a lot better. We set our standards so high now that 15th truly doesn’t represent how good our team really was. Even though I know we should have done better I really have never been prouder to be apart of something. I know all 7 of us ran as hard as we could. I’m still extremely proud to tell everyone we were 15th in the country. We had such a big crowd for us. About 20 guys/gals drove from Williamsburg to come cheer us on. My parents also made the flight to Terre Haute. It was so nice having everyone out there. It’s tough to swallow that our cross country season is over; however, I think it was a very successful one! Hopefully I will get 3 more shots at it! I learned that the meet itself really isn’t that tough. You just have to stay mentally tough.
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