MHS Track and Field HUDSON JV Invite Boys Comment Sheet. Stand Up

Transcription

1 MHS Track and Field HUDSON JV Invite Boys Comment Sheet Stand Up This was a nice meet for a few of you, and we ll get to that in a minute, but there is something important to discuss here. When I take a group of kids to a track meet, I expect you to show-up and race. Instead, Jed, Mason and Wyatt missed their races. To make matters worse, Wyatt missed his relay, and took three other guys out of that race as well. This is unacceptable. Part of being a high school athlete is showing-up and doing your job. There is a lot of stuff going on at a track meet, and when you are in multiple events you need to have some awareness. Hudson s facility is odd in that the discus is about 200m away from the starting line for the sprints, but Wyatt needs to be more aware of the events on the track. Mason wasn t much more than 60 meters away from the shot put when he was sitting in the tent. And he didn t check-in and throw. Jed was in the porta-potty, just a few steps away from the start line. You cannot miss a competition. Those are points we didn t get as a team. With those three guys not competing we missed out on at least 15 team points. I don t like that. Let s not let it happen again. JUMPS In other news, we have some very good jumpers! Devin went After that, Logan Sorenson came over and long-jumped for fun. We didn t record his jumps for the meet results, but we did measure. He went That means his 20 jump on Monday wasn t a fluke. He can do it again. It s probably going to take a 19 5 or 19 6 to make finals on Tuesday in the BRC or 20 6 might be enough for all-brc. Both Devin and Logan are right there. And there was quite a cross-wind in the long jump, which made things much more difficult. The Ryans had a very nice day as well. Ryan Westphal went I watched his jumps and he had two scratches that were at least 18. Ryan Heleniak went 17 1, which is not his best, but it is still solid. Jed is improving, and he had a nice PR, but he needs to get in the 17 s before the end of the season. He s close. As for Cooper, he had an awesome PR in the long jump, but just missed his PR in the triple jump. Meanwhile, James was about a foot away from his triple jump PR, but he had an amazing day at Mondovi. This happens, and is typical. Generally you get a huge, awesome day and then you take a step back before taking another two steps forward. Mitch and Jon also jumped, but missed PRs. We have great jumpers, though. Any time I have a really solid kid, someone with some speed and talent, I give them to Coach Wilson and she makes them into 20 jumpers! COACHING WILSON We are extremely lucky to have Coach Wilson. She was a wonderful long sprinter and cross country for Menomonie back in the early 1980s. She still has the outdoor 400m school record, in fact. After high school she ran at UW LaCrosse before becoming a teacher. She was a head coach at Bloomer for quite a long time before moving back to Menomonie. She s been coaching at MHS since 2004 and has a state champion, a couple of state medalists and a bunch of state qualifying jumpers. This is why our jumpers are sooooo successful. Coach Wilson was once a head coach, back in Bloomer for quite a few years. She s smart, she knows the jumps extremely well and she s the reason that our jumpers are so successful. MID & DISTANCE Way back in 2005 we had 10 boys break 5:00 in the 1600m. That was a pretty good year. Jesse Merkel was 2 nd in state that year. Here s the list of our top 10 that season: 2005 Season PRs 1600m Top 10 Jesse Merkel (12) 4:16 Kelvin Johnson (9) 4:49 Sean Olson (10) 4:22 Mike Merritt (9) 4:55 Dr. Joel Wood (12) 4:34 Todd Wengel (10) 4:56 Tony Carr (12) 4:41 Andy Sol (11) 4:58 Josh Wieland (10) 4:45 Sam Kalschur (11) 4:58

2 Seven of these guys would go on to run in college. Jesse ran on scholarship for Mankato, and was a colligate conference champion in the 5000m. Sean Olson ran for the Golden Gophers of Minnesota, and was their team captain as a senior. He ran 3:43 for the 1500m, which is a faster pace than a four-minute mile. Tony Carr ran for UW Eau Claire and he put-up a 1:53 in the 800m, earning all-wiac honors twice. Josh Wieland also ran for Eau Claire and was all-wiac in cross country. Andy Sol ran for UWEC and he ran 1:56 in the 800m. Mike Merritt, who teaches drivers education for Dunn Right, ran for UW River Falls. Joel Wood (who is now an attending anesthesiologist for a hospital in Grand Rapids) ran for the Wisconsin Track Club. Kelvin Johnson tried a year of college track at UW Stout, but he left after one season. These guys raced 31 times at the state meet in track and cross-country. I don t care to count the number of times these guys were all-conference, but it was probably over 50. Merkel still has the BRC record in the 1600m. They were conference team champs in cross and track. Most of these guys had GPAs above 3.8 and all of them graduated from college. Most have kids of their own now, and are married and have awesome lives. That was By 2010 we were really struggling to find good distance runners Season PRs 1600m Top 6 Nathan Mollan (10) 4:59.8 Steve Harmston (11) 5:07.9 Aaron Brenhoffer (12) 5:02.2 Jared Walters (10) 5:10.0 Nathan Reckard (11) 5:07.2 Shane Miller (9) 5:12.0 That was the low point for our distance crew. These guys were equally awesome. They worked incredibly hard and put in a bunch of effort, but most of them couldn t break 5:00. We tried endlessly 1:15s and 2:30 s for 800m. We tried 300s and 200s and everything we could think of go get these guys to break 5:00, and only Nathan Mollan could do it. In fact, that year there was a 7 th grader named Jack Reinhardt who ran 4:56. So the fastest kind in our school system was a 7 th grader Season PRs 1600m Top 8 Grant Bilse (11) 4:36.4 Nick Brunstad (12) 4:57.8 Al Wittmershaus (11) 4:47.8 Austin Scott (11) 4:59.9 Matt Kieffer (9) 4:53.8 J. Wittmershaus (10) 5:00.1 Christian Gorecki (12) 4:55.8 N. Leonhardt (10) 5:02.6 By 2015 it had cycled back again. The year before Henry Zold had run 4:25 in the 1600m. He paved the way for guys like Grant and Al. Of course, Matt and Jerry and Noah are still in the school, although only Matt has stuck with track, and he s run 4:46 this year. But this group scored quite a few points at the BRC meet that year Season PRs 1600m Top 6 Matt Kieffer (11) 4:46 Alec Bailey (11) 5:09 Jack Leipnitz (10) 4:55 Tyler Buhr (9) 5:09 Simon Fichter (9) 4:58 Dane Dittmann (11) 5:14 Look at where we are now, in We have three sub 5 s. Also, our distance group doesn t have a senior in the bunch. Jerry and Noah quit. It s all freshmen, sophomores and juniors. What does this mean? Well, our distance crew has some serious upside over the next couple of years. Guys like Simon and Rocco and Jack have such huge upsides. None of them run year round, or even during the winter. What does Rocco look like with an extra 2000 miles in his legs? What about Simon? How fast is Jack with 3000 more miles? Hopefully we ll find out. This stuff moves in cycles, of course, but some of it is a result of having tough kids that aren t afraid to work hard. We all know that distance running is hard. ANY high school sport is hard, if you do it right. Endurance sports, though are really hard. You have to have the proper mindset. That s what those guys had in That s what we were missing in This year began with a Stokke Trail. I took Simon, Wyatt, Rocco, James, Forrest, Adrien and Daniel The King on a 5k run. A simple Stokke. Simon did great. Rocco and Wyatt really struggled. Forrest, Adrien and Daniel The King hung up with me and Simon. We were leading

3 the way. Remember? It was a very pleasant day in March - probably 45 degrees. A few boys took off their shirts to enjoy the warm weather. As we were approaching Kwik Trip a hugely overweight, beaded man eating chips rolled down his window and yelled at us to put our shirts on. Then he swore at us. I can t remember exactly what he said, but it was really nasty. That run seems like it occurred last year, but it was only 9 weeks ago. We struggled to hit 8:00 pace on that run, and the girls distance runners were waaaaaay ahead of us. I know that I could have easily dropped any of those boys just by picking up the tempo. Let s look at the group now. Rocco and Simon could easily crush me on any run. They are training with Kieffer and Dame for their mileage, and they run usually right around 7:00 pace for an extended run (five miles or so). Simon even broke 5:00 for the1600m on Thursday, hitting remarkable splits 1:11, 1:17, 1:15, 1:15. We preach that 3 rd lap. Bury yourself on that 3 rd lap if you have to, but go fast on lap 3. Go go go. Simon did it. Remember how he looked running those first couple workouts back in March? Backward lean, shoulders back, arms wide? Now he s looking amazing great stride, great arms, long, lean. He looks like a runner. And he s coachable, which is the most important part of this. Forrest ran 2:23 in the 800m, coming off of the Musical. He didn t practice much because of his obligation, but he did run as best as he could. And he ran 2:23, which is very close to my freshmen PR of 2:21 (and I ran 1:55 my first year of college). Wyatt ran 55.4 at Mondovi. The King, battling an injury, was back to 2:37. He s running just as fast with an injury as he ran earlier in the season healthy. Adrien ran 57. It wasn t that long ago that he was running 1:04. I d bet he could break 2:20 in the 800m. That s a great group of rookies. Is this the kind of group that could take our team to the level we were at in 2005? What will this group look like in 2020? Simon, Rocco, Adrien, Wyatt, Forrest, maybe Tyler Burr and The King they will all be seniors, with Patrick Schwartz as a junior. If these guys get miles in their legs over the next three years, we could be unstoppable. Who s going to lead the way? Kieffer and Dane have one year left. Who s going to lead after that? Which of these freshmen has the capacity to lead? We ll see. Creckin ran 5:48. It was pretty clear that his back was bothering him yet again. That s too bad, because he s been looking sharp in his workouts and with his mileage lately. Kevin. Kevin, Kevin, Kevin. He s stuck. He s running nearly everything at 6:10 pace. His 3200m is 12:20. His mile is, like, 6:05. What are we going to do? Kev likes to sit behind the last place guy, about 10 meters behind, and wait. And wait. At some point, Kev, you gotta make a move. We put him in the 800m and asked him to run as fast as he could. 2:47. That s, at least, 5:34 pace for a mile. Maybe we can do that at the next meet! I d love to see Kevin go out hard at the next meet. Take the lead. As for Jack, he came back from his time off with a great 800m. 2:12 is a wonderful time, and it was an extremely well run race. I like the 1:05 off the start. Jack was boxed-in and he had to make some major moves over the first 250m just to get outside, and that hurt him a bit, but he didn t have much of a choice. Without the moves, it would have been a 1:04 off the start, and probably a 2:11. His time was so good I contemplated putting him in the open 800m at the BRC, but I think we ll leave him in the 4x800m relay. Alec Bailey ran his first 3200m of the year. 11:24, right where we thought he d be. He has to run 3 seconds faster per lap to break 11:00, and I think he can do it. He was in space for his entire race floating with a guy 30m ahead and another 30m behind. That s hard to do. Alec is a very good runner, and he could break 10:30 next year. Miles. That s all he needs. Miles. THROWS Waylon threw 41 5, and won the meet. However, somehow they missed this and had him in 3 rd with a 38, for some reason. No big deal. That happens from time to time. It was an error from the meet workers. If we had caught it that day, we could have changed it. He did win the discus with a 121, which isn t quite a PR but it s still awfully good. He ll have to be that good or better to make finals on Tuesday, but he has a good shot. Tony had a great PR in the discus, but missed one in the shot put. This was a pretty solid day for the young man. Meanwhile, Daniel The King threw above 80 for the first time ever in the discus, while missing a PR in the shot. Mitchel also missed a PR in the shot. What was going on in the shot? Were we getting bad marks from the workers?

4 The discus, though, was quite a bit better. Wyatt had a PR, nearly breaking 90, while Jake threw over 80 for the first time in a while. Mason threw 103 and had a nice PR, even though he did miss the shot put. As for Harmston, he s a bit stuck as well. Mondovi was a tough day, too, but I think he ll preform quite well at BRC. Sometimes you get stuck, and that usually comes just before a breakout. VAULT Joey was a bit stuck. He even missed the last meet! At Hudson, though, he went 10 for the first time. Remember when we were so pumped to have a 9 freshmen? Now we have Shawn at 10 6, Jake at 10 and now Joey at 10. We have Giljohann at 9, although he went 8 at Hudson. Matt and Ben have both gone 8. Sure, they are both a bit stuck too, but that s part of the deal. Being stuck happens occasionally. It s hard to be stuck, but when you have that break-out, as Joey did, it s all worthwhile. This group could all go 11 next year, if they work hard over the summer and winter. This group could go 12 as juniors and 13 as seniors. Wouldn t that be amazing? To have a bunch of 13 guys on the team? Keep working hard, guys, because you all have a great thing going. SPRINTS Logan wanted to break The gun sounded and he was out hard, easily in the lead. But he got tired in the middle of the race and three guys passed him , into the wind. Logan is faster on the turn. That s all. His stride isn t long, and it s perfect for the turn. I d bet that if we had a 100m on a turn race, Logan would be amazing. We do have such a race, of course, with the 4x100m relay, and Logan can run the lead leg and own that first 100m. The straightaway? We ll save that for next year. Alan is a much better 200m guy than 100m guy. Still, the wind was heavy, and he missed PRs in both the 100m and 200m. He was only one spot out of scoring in the 200m, in fact. But I think Alan was pretty upset by not being able to run the 4x200m relay due to Wyatt s absence and he had a tough time refocusing. We re going to need a much better response on Tuesday, and I think Alan will give it to us. Labs ran 57.3, not quite the 55 he was looking for, but not bad either. If Jason had a few more 400s he could get down to that 55. BUT, his last 2 races were 400s, and I think it s going to make his 300m hurdles so much better on Tuesday. Schemenauer ran This isn t bad, but James is a much better 400m runner than 200m runner, and I d bet that he d be a wonderful 800m runner, if he was willing to try it. His time was a PR, and that s awesome, but I think he could run a 2:15 in the 800m. Adrien loves the 200m and 400m. His times are great, and a huge reason for that is his early season 800s. It s a great lesson for you kids run some 800s early on and those sprints will be much easier. Heleniak would have been 7 th or 8 th in the 300m hurdles, but he doesn t want to do the 300m hurdles anymore, so I put him in the 200m. He was 26 th. Great long jumper, and he could be a great hurdler, but he doesn t like it, even though he has some talent. That s too bad in the 100m, 26.8 in the 200m. I think he could run sub 50 in the 300h, and that s a wonderful time. Now, Ryan has to do what he wants to do, but not many kids can run under 50 in the 300h. Cooper Gorecki keeps showing-up, working hard and he s starting to figure it all out. Running into the wind, he missed a PR in both the 200m and 100m, but he looks so much stronger than he did just a few weeks ago. Mitch got ahead of Jon for the first time ever. Mitch ran 20.5, crushing his previous best. This was an excellent time. Mitch works extremely hard in practice, in both track and swim, and he s getting more and more fit. Jon is right where Mitch was last season, still learning and figuring out the sport. These guys are lucky to have one another, and I m looking forward to watching them train together next year, when Jon is a little more experienced. Still, we re awfully lucky to have these guys on the team, with Coach Gilbert leading the way. HURDLES Ryan is a pretty solid 110m hurdler, and I think he can go sub 20 this season, if he wants to hurdle, that is. He has the capacity to be a great hurdler in a couple of years. It just takes some practice and repetition. As for Marcus, his form is elite, and now we just need to get him some

5 fitness and speed. Marcus, do cross country. It would be difficult, but it would make a huge difference for your hurdling, because you have some great potential. And Jed, don t miss your race ever again. 4x400m Simon ran in the 56s. That s an awfully good day for Simon, with two huge milestone PRs. Ryan ran in the 54s, a three second PR. That doesn t happen much. Devin ran 55, which isn t a PR. And he really tanked over the last 100m. He s had quite a few races in a very short time, but the long weekend will put him in a great position for BRC. As for Jack, he missed his PR, but he was very fresh off of the 800m (he had, maybe, 30 minutes rest) and he hadn t quite recovered. 2 nd place against a very good Hudson team is a very solid finish, and two HUGE PRs were just awesome.