New Years Resolution

I know it has been a long time since I posted on here. I hope everyone had a great holiday season and has had a great start to the new year.

My New Year’s resolution this year is to read more. I want to read at least a chapter of a book a night, and to spend the first part of my morning at work reading blogs, research articles etc about training, coaching, recruiting etc… I felt that since I have arrived at McPherson I have not done enough reading. I have read a few books, but I need to stay up with the most cutting edge training philosophies and I figured this would be the best way to do it. Currently I am reading Brad Hudson’s book Run Faster. It has a lot of good stuff in it. It also has a lot of things that I am already doing, or things I can tweet to make our program better.

Another New Year’s resolution is to update my blogs more often. So I will try and make a post on my personal blog once a week and on the team’s blog around the same. I also would like to have my assistants be more involved with the blogging process.

Marathon Debut

So this past weekend I made my Marathon Debut. The weather was very nice, 40-45 deg about a 15 mph wind but most of the time it was at our backs and I was feeling good going into it. Started off with a conservative mile and then one a little quicker. Was running with another guy and we started clipping off 6 or sub 6 min miles on the uphill portion of the course. I was still feeling good but didn't want to over do it too early so I backed off and let him go and ran a 6:26 mile and the plan was to settle in at between 6:10 and 6:00. being 9 miles in i started running at or bellow 6 min feeling very comfortable and smooth. my 12th mile was a 5:57 and I was just following the two guys in front of me who were in 2nd, and 3rd place. i took a left hand turn with a lady standing at the turn. I then noticed that the arrows were going in the wrong direction but thought maybe this was the part of the course were we doubled up. then i saw the 14 mile mark facing backwards, then i passed the leader coming at me. No one along the way said anything. I started getting near the half thon mark when a lady told me i was going the wrong way. About 5 seconds later Becky yelled, "they sent you the wrong way turn around." so i stopped and turned around. After that i felt like I was just not in it mentally. All of this happened on the air force base. Nothing about the air force base was good. The water stops sucked, the course sucked. I was still maintaining around 6 teenish miles for the rest of the race but i was all alone, no fans and not even sure if i was going the right way for the remainder of the race. I ended up finishing 3rd in 2:44:10

Splits were
6:24, 6:12, 5:56, 6:00, 5:49, 5:49, 5:51, 6:26, 5:52, 5:59, 6:00, 5:57, 14:35 (sent wrong way), 6:18, 6:13, 6:15, 6:30, 6:26, 6:08, 12:32 (split and water stop in same spot), 6:25, 6:29, 6:33, 6:08, 1:13

New Start

This weekend marks my first meet as a head cross country coach. So far things have been a lot better as a first time head cross country coach than they were as a track coach. A lot of it has to do with the athletes knowing where I stand and setting up my expectations early on. I am excited to see where we are and how we do against different colored jerseys.

As for my training. I have had a down week which has been very nice but the reality of having an up week next week will set in soon and I will have to be a lot more disciplined with getting up and doing my runs in the mornings. It is hard to find time to get them in since I will be running farther than everyone on the team on most days. So far so good. Had a good 2 hour run last Sunday, was tired and sore from it but it felt good to get back to training and not just running to run....

With the past few weeks being very busy with Camp etc... my recruiting phone calls kind of fell to the way side but I got back on it last night and had some good calls. I need to keep plugging away and utilize the fact that Becky has started grad school and spends a lot of time studying to my advantage and make my calls then. I am excited to see what I can do with a full year of working with recruits. I feel we have a good base of athletes and if we can get another good year we will become very competitive very quick.

911

Watching a special on 9/11. Some of the stories are blowing me away. They told a story of a women who's birthday was 9/11. Her husbands car was found in the rubble in the trunk of that car they found her still wrapped birthday present from her husband. How meaningful was that present.

NEO XC Camp

I spent the last week back in OHIO for the annual NEO Cross Country Camp. They had two weeks of camp this year but because of Level 2 I was only able to make the second week. As usual it was a great week and got me motivated for the upcoming xc season. I had a good cabin, which is always key. I got a lot of miles in 93 and got to know a lot of new kids. It would be great if I could get a kid or two each year from Ohio to come out to Kansas.

Level 2

Last week I was at USATF level 2 coaching school in Boulder CO. On the way out to boulder we drove through two hail storms. The second one was very bad, cars all over had windows busted out taillights out. We kept driving and made it through will only a few dents in the car so I feel fortunate.

I love Boulder and was glad I got to spend time there. On the flip side I wish I could have spent more time enjoying Boulder. I spent the first three days of the school in class from 8 am to 6:30 pm and would then go home and study till around 10 go to bed then get up at 5:30 to run in the morning. I passed my Sports Science test, which anyone who went to college with me knows that Anatomy and Physiology is not my strong suite. They kept the test questions to the basics so I felt very good about the test when I got done.

Next up was the throws section of the school. I was now in class from 8 am till 9:30 pm every day. When I would get home I would study for about an hour then go to bed. This whole week was very stressful for me. There was a lot of new terms for me to learn and techniques. All in all it was a difficult course but I learned a ton. I plan on going back and doing a different event area next year, depending on how the school progresses (there are changes coming down the tube) I will either do Jumps or Endurance.

I did get to spend some quality time in boulder on my runs. I stayed with my cousin and he lives within running distance of my favorite places. I got to run south creek path several time and in Chautauqua park a few times. Jay came down from Aspen area to visit and we got a few runs in as well, I had not seen him in over a year so it was great to hang out with him.

Up next for me is another road trip. This time back to OHIO for NEO XC Camp. It should be a good time.

beck wins 4th race

http://www.thekansan.com/sports/x631615225/First-time-winners-claim-CTF-run-titles

I was off in Kansas City for a bachelor party this weekend for our old throws coach, so I was not able to attend the race. Becky managed to lock her keys in the car so she was not able to wear racing flats. With a point to point race she also had to get a ride back to the start line to meet AAA to sign for them getting into the car. All in all not a bad javascript:void(0)day hahahaha.

We went over to a friends house for a cook out. We had some burgers and played some washers. Budic would have been very disappointed at my awful display. This is the first state I have lived in where it is legal to set off fireworks on the 4th. It sounded like a war zone out side from 6 am till midnight. Crazy.

I have been very saddened by the loss of Michael Jackson. The world has lost the greatest entertainer to ever walk the earth. the end of his memorial service today summed it up for me with his daughter breaking down on stage. I think sometimes people forget that he was a person like you and me and had feelings too. I hope the world remembers him for the influence of his music and not the accusations and craziness that surrounded him. RIP MJ