Let the running begin...

The time has come!!!! Yes you guessed it, track season is almost here! Exactly 23 days until first practice! How do we feel about this? I'm feelin a little shaky, considering there's still snow on the ground, but I am very excited.

Last year, the season at my school was a little rough. We have over 2000 people in our school and yet only 30 girls go out for track. Doesn't seem right does it? So if you didn't already guess, that means we're lacking in the speed department. We only had 1 girl go to Drake Relays this year and my freshman year I had 3 events go, plus like 15 more events.

Track is an individual sport, but it's also a very team dependent sport too. If your not fast enough to make it to State in open events, your whole team has to be on point. One messes up hand off and all your hopes and dreams are over (maybe I'm exaggerating that!). 

I am dreading the first, maybe 2 weeks or so of season because those are the days where your getting back into running everyday  and your legs feel like they are going to fall off. This happens to me every year! Last year was a little worse because I'm vitamin D deficient and apparently if you don't have enough vitamin D in your body, your muscles can't get rid of lactic acid (the stuff that makes it sore). It was a terrible time! I recommend taking ice baths, they actually work. It is terribly hard to make yourself do them, but it's worth it I promise! Once you force yourself to get in, stay in for like 10 minutes. Your legs will eventually go numb so it won't be as bad!

Practicing is a hard thing to do for track because if you're not already fast, there's not much practicing can do to help you. Plus, practices at our school are outrageous. One day last year, we did 17 200's at 100%. I felt like I was going to die! In the long run, I think those kind of days paid off because we turned our season around and ended up bringing 18 girls to the State Track Meet. Always a really fun experience. It is very important for every runner, may you be distance or sprinter, to work on your fast twitch and your slow twitch muscles. Alternate days of practicing hard sprinting and days of longer strides. For sprinters, long strides are not as important unless you are a 400 runner. 

Hopefully you are all ready to get runnin, because first day of practice is right around the corner!