44 and Counting!

Yesterday was the first day of R-MA’s Cross Country Season. Since I teach at the middle school, I had to hurry to make it to practice on time due to scheduling conflicts. As I crested the hill to go towards our meeting point, I saw a wave of students in athletics. A cacophony of noise went out upon my approach, “Coach Ilnicki!” “Ill-a-becky” and “COOOAAACH!” were among the battle cries.

Overwhelmed, I shuffled my way through the barrage of high-fives, fist bumps, and the occasional “bro hug.”

The 2014 R-MA XC Team (source: http://www.rma.edu/Varsity-cross-country)

WOW! Is this some kind of joke? Why are there so many? Scanning the crowd, I estimated around 35 students. Whoa, what? We usually have a team of around 15-20 (actual roster number is 44 – this does not include the middle school runners)!

Not anticipating this huge of a turn out, or the range of abilities, I was briefly knocked off my game. I gathered myself, found a high spot to stand on and asked for their attention. After a brief bit of introductions and taking attendance (I only knew roughly half of the runners), it was time to get down to business.

Baptism by fire would be the best way to describe the day. 3.1 miles of a grueling course out in the sun with its rays pelting your skin until it was soaked with sweat. To much of my surprise, a good chunk were able to finish the course with no shortcuts or stopping early (roughly 60%). Now, I’m not saying it was fast, they were told to go easy, but heck – being able to run/walk a 5K without a prior practice had me intrigued.

Now comes the challenging part. I believe in a “no-cut” policy. If you are signing up to run and stick with it, you got my vote. If it’s not your cup of tea, I understand if you quit. No hard feelings as running is not for everyone. But the hard part now is separating the casual/social runners from the elite.

I hate labeling students for a fear of self-fulfilling prophecy. Sometimes if a coach says a runner should be in a slower group, negative thoughts enter the brain, and now that runner doesn’t think they can be fast enough. I also believe just the opposite can be true. If a runner is deemed not fast enough at the beginning of the year, they might bust their tail in order to prove to themselves that coach was wrong.

So, what’s this coach going to do? I’m not entirely sure. This first week is going to be a time to feel out where everyone is at. From there, I might make 3 distinct (with times/effort) groups: Club Group (there for socialization, fitness goals, losing weight, but are non-competitive), Intermediate Group (middle of the pack runners who have the potential to prove themselves and step up to a higher level of competition) and Varsity Group (the runners who are there to win and have produced fast enough times to be considered the top runners).

This model will be fluid, giving the runners a chance to switch groups when they improve in performance. This will also allow me to tailor to their needs at practice, i.e. a 30:00+ runner should not be doing the same thing as a sub 19:00.

As a brief aside, I plan on chronicling both my XC team and my person marathon training for the next few months. Let me know what you think, and by all means feel free to give suggestions!