Been a long time

It has been a long time since I have posted on here. And in that time a lot has happened, I don't even know where to begin. This year has had its ups and downs. Fortunately it has had more ups than downs. I have slept in more beds and couches than I care to remember, I have spent more time on the road than I ever have in the past. Between trips for the team going to meets and trips for recruiting it has been a very busy year.

For recruiting I have gone to California three times, Texas twice, Missouri at least three times. All of the trips were productive in one way or another. I have gone through patches where we would have 5 kids verbally commit and sign and others where I would have 5 kids tell me we were not established enough of a program, and who could blame them looking at our past. But I was not concerned with our past and knew if I just kept working and made one more call or made one more home visit that we would get maybe one more kid. As of today we have 28 new men and 10 new women with the recruiting not done just yet. In the past couple of weeks we have had a hot streak of men committing to the program. I am hoping that we can get a few more girls to come on board before the summer ends. Next year is going to be exciting.

As for the current team we have made huge leaps and bounds from where we were last year. Things can always go smoother and I still have a lot of learning to do as a young coach, but we are making some great progress. Both the men and the women scored more points at conference than they have in recent history and we had several conference champs and even a National Champ. I am very excited for what the future holds for McPherson College track and cross country.

Personally I wore myself down this year. I have still only had two days off of work since winter break. I have been sleeping in all of this week and plan on sleeping in until I feel my body has caught up with lack of sleep. 5 hours just doesn't cut it for me. I have stuck to my new years resolution fairly well and have been reading more. I have read several books, mostly about running or coaching and plan to continue to do this. I hope this summer that I will be able to read even more. My running has taken a hit due to injury the past few months but I hope to get rid of the nail that seems to be stuck in my heal in the next few weeks by meeting with a ART doc i talked with yesterday who has a practice in Wichita.

For now I think that catches up on where my life is. I hope this summer to get a good start on recruiting for next year, to get more organized with the administrative side of things and to read and learn a lot. I am very excited for what the next school year will bring and to see all the hard work this year pay off.

Catching up

I have been watching and reading a lot from Jay Johnson the past two days. I really like a lot of the stuff he does. I have incorporated the same things into my teams strength routine and have found great results from it. He has lots of videos on his web site. I highly suggest checking it out. http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/

I have had a real roller coaster ride the past few days with recruiting, but whats new. Had a great long weekend with my top 3 recruits.

Showed them all there is to see in this area of Kansas. They all had a good time. Two of them are now signed. I am still waiting on one, who happens to be the best of the three. These three would make a huge impact, possibly even take us to the next level in half a year. But only time will tell and right now I am just sitting and waiting for his response. Every time my phone goes off i get nervous and my heart sinks a little. You might ask why would my heart sink. Well I have had 2 girls and 2 guys who were a done deal tell me they are no longer coming to McPherson College next fall. Nothing that I could do, one has some Dr. apts and a follow up surgery, another wants a major we do not have etc.... So we will see where we are at in the next week. I am going start focusing on the class of 2010 starting Monday. So it will be back to the phones for initial calls with the goal of getting kids on campus for visits over the summer. So i will keep you updated.

My running has been very up and down. Now that the college and high school kids are back into the swing of things I am getting more miles in. I am doing what I can to hit every group run in the area that I can and running twice a day for the past few days. By no means am I fit, but I am enjoying running a lot more than i have since Feb. 1. I did a few workouts on the track Mt. Union style and had fun with that. I still have nothing to train for which I find hard. I need a goal and I need to go for that goal. If anyone has any suggestions for what you think I should be training for please let me know. I could use some help.

All in all the summer has been good. I saw a tornado for the first time in my life, its been hot, but I have had some fun. Hope things keep going in a positive direction on the whole.

trying times

This has been one of the most difficult seasons of my life. There have been individuals on the team that did not buy into my philosophy at all and have fought me the whole way. I am looking forward to next year. I feel that the kids we have coming back and coming in will help change the attitude at practice everyday to a positive one. As of right now we will have 13 new men and 6 new women. I am hoping to continue to add to this number. The kids coming in seem to be hard workers looking to succeed on the track and in the class room. I am still looking to fill a few more empty slots on the team, but we are heading in the right direction and if I can pick up a few more kids between now and August we will be fine.

the begining of a new adventure

Becky and I started off from Meadville at around 5:30 pm. We drove through the snow until around 10:30 when we arrived in London Ohio where we stayed with our friend Ryan Ladd. He rents a very nice house on the outskirts of town. We stayed up talking with him for about an hour or so then went to bed.

The next morning we got up had some cereal and hit the road again around 8:00 am. Our next destination was Greencastle Indiana. We drove down 70 till we got to Greencastle. WHen we arived we met D-rock and Ellis for a short run around town. We then met up with Kori and Stacey for lunch. It was good to see the DePauw people. Unfortunetly they had just gotten a heavy snow so we were not able to run in the Nature Park. After lunch we jumped back in the car with St Louis being our destination. We drove past the Arch and past Wash U to stop at Cameron's house for a little while where we got to shower and talk with Cammy for a little before heading to Stiles house. We went to CiCi's with the Stiles family which was a blast. After dinner we went back to there house and hung out for a while before bed.

The last day of the trip was an early one. We had to get up at 5:30ish to make sure we got to McPherson in time so I could move the few possesions that I had into our new apartment. After a few hours of driving and at one point I thought we were going to run out of gas becasue there were no gas stations for miles, we made it safe and sound to McPherson.

I was able to get into my office and get some things aranged. Everyone was very welcoming and helpful. It was a long trip and I might add some more detail later and will add pictures for sure.

Finally here

We finally arrived in McPherson yesterday at 1:30 pm. We drove straight to our new apt and signed the papers and unpacked the few things I had, then moved into my new office then ran then groceries then back to the office. I have a feeling I will be spending a lot of time in the office trying to get organized until Becky gets back.

Today is the day

Its finally here. The day I start my drive to Kansas. I am feeling better now that I know I am at least going to be heading in the right direction. My going away present from Meadville was about 20 inches of snow. My run yesterday was more of a training scene from Rocky IV than anything else as I ran up the sidewalks in knee deep snow. Today at 5:00 eastern time Becky and I will get in the car and start heading South, then west. We are going to stay in London Ohio tonight with our friend Ryan Ladd then stay friday night in St. Louis with our friend Jeff Stiles. Then Saturday we will finish the drive off and hopefully move into our new Town Home on Saturday afternoon. But there is a lot to get done before 5:00. I have to get my last run in Meadville in then there is an Assistant Coaches meeting talking about budgets, which I am going to sit in on to learn as much as I can, then I have to do some laundry, pack and get ready for the drive. The is finally here, I can't wait.......

Moving on

I have accepted the job as head coach at McPherson College in McPherson Kansas. This is a very exciting time for me. This is my chance to finally prove that I have what it takes to build a successful college Track & Field/Cross Country program. As I spend my last few days at Allegheny College I think back to all the good times and things I have learned that have gotten me to this point. In a few days I will pack up my Jeep and start heading West down 70. I am very excited to arrive and start building a dynasty with the Bulldogs of McPherson College.