Every Saturday during cross-country season, every MVXC athlete is asked to get out of bed early–either for a race, or for a 7am practice.
That 7am practice is optional, and everyone knows it will be challenging–MVXC plans a hard run on Saturday morning when the weather is cool and we can run our best. Saturday morning practice is a grit test. Anyone can get up early and challenge themselves to improve. All you need to do is get to bed at a reasonable hour, set your alarm, get up and come to the track ready for a workout. Talent does not matter, genetics does not matter, nothing matters except each athlete’s willingness to decide to show up and do the work to improve. So Saturday morning practice is a grit test–who is willing to make the effort?
MVXC had a lot of athletes pass their grit test with flying colors this Saturday! As the sun was rising, the team rolled out of the Monta Vista High School track to head out for one of our classic workouts–Matador Miles. It’s a tough workout. This Saturday was a repeat of the workout we ran on August 31, so we had an opportunity to compare our results to the prior workout. Of the athletes that ran both workouts, the following athletes ran more Matador Miles on September 28 than August 31:
Increased Matador Mile Volume
(August 31 to September 28)
Vivian Cheng
Upasana Dilip
Agnes Wang
Conner Hsu
Pranav Reddy
Andrew Richardson
Coach Flatow
These athletes had a faster pace for their Matador Miles after four weeks of training:
Improved Matador Mile Pace
(August 31 to September 28)
Ellie Hsu
Sylvana Northrop
Triya Roy
Nikhita Saldi
Jannah Sheriff
Ethan Lam
Nitin Subramanian
While these athletes incredibly had a faster average pace while at the same time increasing the number of repetitions:
Increased Matador Mile Volume and Improved Pace
(August 31 to September 28)
Insiah Kizilbash
Vivian Lau
Andrew Cole
Sotirios Kougiouris
Well done, everyone! It is so easy to be proud of this team; this is such a hard working group that is working hard and supporting each other. I can see how all of you are not only working to improve, and I can also see your appreciation for each others’ effort and grit.
Some Notes from the IAAF World Track Championships at Doha, Qatar
How about the USA women in the 800m?–three American’s in the final! I really love watching the 800–the fastest race where athletes don’t have to stay in lanes makes the 800m an exciting race for a spectator. (The 800m is also an incredibly painful race for the athlete.)
Tbe Co-Ed 4×400 was so much fun to watch!
October 2 will be the opening round of the women’s 1500, and one of the US qualifiers is Nikki Hiltz. Nikki ran for Aptos High School, graduating in 2013–Monta Vista athletes raced with her many times. It’s pretty cool seeing a recent CCS athlete go all the way to Worlds!
Looking for More Photos from the SCVAL Opener at Baylands?
One of the Palo Alto parents, Malcolm Slaney, has posted a lot of great photos from the recent SCVAL meet at Baylands. Mr. Slaney’s son graduated a couple years ago, but Mr. Slaney still comes out and takes photos of SCVAL races when he has the chance–and like our Mr. Ma, is also an excellent action photographer!