AAU Club Nationals and Moving Forward

I just got back from a great week at the AAU Club National Championships in Orlando, Florida.  It was an awesome time and the kids really enjoyed it.  Despite the heat, despite the weather delay on Saturday, the amount of work the kids have done this past year paid off.  I've said before that I love for my athletes to compete over the summer because for young runners, gaining valuable experience in racing and pushing yourself in a hard effort more important than jogging around all summer, waiting four months to run the next race.

Two of my girls have taken off over a minute and a half in their two mile times since the school season ended two months ago!  That could not have happened if we were doing long, slow distance each day.  People have asked me if I was worried about over racing my athletes.  Not really, mainly because I'm smart enough to train my runners with built in recovery after hard efforts and arrange races as part of the training program.  Kids who get injured racing in the summer are the ones who try to run hard efforts off of only jogging.  The summer racing circuit is a tool that every runner should take advantage of.  And it's also nice to earn some hardware along the way.

Most of my runners wrapped up their summer season either this week or will next week.  Only one or two will make the trek to Ypsilanti, Michigan to compete in the Junior Olympics.  Many of my athletes will take their vacations over the next few weeks, then we will hit the ground running in preparation for cross country.  This season I hope to reach out and help more athletes who struggle to find direction with their training as well as offer advice to those looking to compete in college.  I expect to update the College Scholarships section as I have recently talked to a few college coaches who will send me their scholarship standards.  Don't forget, even if you can't earn a scholarship, it is worth walking on to try and continue to train and race at your best!

As I said, we had a great week at Disney.  Thirteen athletes I work with went to the meet and we had twelve top 10 performances!


3000 Meters: (Name, Team, Age Group, Place, Mark)
Justin Unger, Southern Athletics, 11B, 9th Place, 12;28
Breeann Martin, Southern Athletics, 13G, 6th Place, 12:24
Zachary Barthel, Southern Athletics, 13B, 5th Place, 10:31
Denton Young, Southern Athletics, 14B, 8th Place, 11:01
Brady Mitchell, Southern Athletics, 14B, 10th Place, 11:58
Dionysia Love, Southern Athletics, 17-18G, 2nd Place, 12:17

1500 Meters
Zachary Barthel, Southern Athletics, 13B, 9th Place, 4:47
Jeanee Romero, Southern Athletics, 17-18G, 6th Place, 5:17
Dionysia Love, Southern Athletics, 17-18G, 10th Place, 5:29

800 Meters
Tyrone Hayes, 747 TC, 9B, 8th Place, 2:45

4x800 Meters
Southern Athletics, 13B, 7th Place, 10:19

Shotput
Rick McClendon, Southern Athletics, 15-16B, 8th Place, 39-10