State T-Shirts

We will offer State Champion shirts through the school store for anyone who would like to purchase one. I will have a design and more details on cost and how to purchase one in the near future. Ordering through the school store will allow for any parent, athlete, student, faculty member etc to purchase one and alleviate any coordinating from the coaches and booster club.

If you have an idea for a state champion shirt design, please send to me.

State Rings

State Championship rings will be offered to any member of the team. All members have contributed to the success of our state championship in some way or another – not just the 7 that ran. The ring design is shown below.

Rings will be ordered through Balfour. A Balfour rep visited with the boy's team today during athletics and discussed the ring purchasing process. There are many ring companies out there but previous coaches that have ordered state rings prefer the quality and detail of Balfour.

We will size the boys for rings Tuesday – Thursday of this week.

Any runner wanting a ring will need to write their name on our list along with what size needed by Thursday of this week.

Cost of rings will be around $350 and an exact cost will be determined soon. The Balfour Rep mentioned that it is possible the rings might be delivered before Christmas. Payment would be needed when they are delivered and that information will be sent out soon.

Don't let this opportunity slip by! Only one team in the state gets the honor.

School Board Presentation

Our state team will be recognized by the school board this Wednesday night at 7:30 PM. If you would like to support this presentation all are welcome.

XC Banquet

Runners and families should have RSVP'd already but the banquet will be this Thursday at 7:00 PM in the Sloan Creek cafeteria. Please click here for the invitation for more details.

Going Forward

State runners will continue running this week through the Nike South meet. Those runners will take the entire Thanksgiving break off from running — unless they are wanting to run a local turkey trot they may do so.

JV runners that took last week off will be running 3 days this week and back to full running over the Thanksgiving break.

I am very excited about the upcoming track season and what it will have in store for our distance runners. Although I have mainly worked with the boy's team this year for cross country I am also the Head Girls Track coach. After the Thanksgiving break I will mainly be working with the girl's track program and overseeing all aspects of it to prepare for the track season. I will still see the guys each day and also be working with Greg on the workouts, paces etc that the boys team will be doing through the track season.

Track is very important to each runner's progression as a distance runner. Several of our state meet runners this year were JV runners last year and made great improvements from last year’s track season. Becoming a great distance runner is what you put in to it. Training diligently through the XC season, training through the track season, and then making sure the summer running is accomplished as well. If you think we had a strong team this year, Greg and I believe we can have an even stronger and deeper team next year. But we have to have all runners bought in and continue training through the track season and following our plan. I can foresee our boys team having a total of 10-12 runners next XC season running sub 17 minutes and possibly 5 running sub 16 minutes. That may seem crazy to some but look at what we were able to accomplish this year and know that we can raise the bar to new heights for next season. Anything is possible with a goal, work ethic, and determination.

Click here for the tentative track meet schedule for the 2016-2017 season.

There will be a parent and athlete track meeting on Monday November 28th at 6:30 PM in the LHS Cafeteria.

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

The guys had a great day on the course, and what I am most proud of today, is that they did it as a TEAM ... a :20 spread from 1-5 is almost unheard of at that level and the guys ran the same race they have been running all season ... I could tell after the first 800m when they made the button-hook turn that we were going to be hard to beat the way they went out and got established in front as a team ... It's very cool when all 7 guys have races they are proud of when they get back on the bus ...

Thank you so much for all the parents/athletes and supporters who made the trek down for the race. Mr. Mayfield and his wife/Coach Puckett and Coach Herrema were in attendance and provided great support for Carson and the guys ... One thing I would like to mention ... I see so many parallels in our program and Donna North. They are only 3 or 4 years old as a school and already producing at the State level, much like we did after 3 years. Their guys and coaches exhibited such sportsmanship and our guys had a good time being with them post race ... Another cool thing was that they had some of the original members of the team McFarlane from California speak at their school and they were on hand after the race and spoke to the guys.

I can't thank all of the Lovejoy community enough for putting up with me over the years ... Logan, Carly and I really appreciate the support shown.

I look forward to seeing everyone at the banquet.

Run Happy Run Long,

Greg

Sophomore Carson Hockersmith (19:39.81, 66th overall) made the most of her first State appearance and set a PR. Carson has been coming back from a stress fracture all season, and it was great to watch her turn in her best performance. She concluded what has been a solid comeback season for the girls.
[results]

The Varsity Boys won the 5A State Championship today and made it look easy. They completed a storybook season going wire-to-wire as the #1 5A team in the State of Texas. Nice. The Lovejoy XC faithful know how much our boys and the coaches put into this. And the parents and coaches all appreciate the strain that goes along with such lofty expectations. But the boys handled the season so smoothly despite any turbulence. Last spring Lovejoy graduated 2 XC mainstays in Will Wise and Noah Landguth. And remember that last year's super frosh Cole Hinton (#3 for Lovejoy at State in 17:27.34) got deported to Wisconsin. So how could this be anything but a rebuilding year for the boys. Yet coming out the summer training program, we knew they had something going. Although it looked like they were peaking too early at the Gerald Richey, the boys consistently improved throughout the season.

One of the nerve-wracking aspects of watching the UIL State Cross Country Championships is trying to judge team scoring. The disorientation in estimating how your team has scored is caused by all those jackrabbits running loose on the course. The term "jackrabbit" is a Lovejoy euphemism for individual State qualifiers running unattached from a team. Today the jackrabbits took 8 of the top 11 overall finishes, and 14 of the top 30 overall finishes. While this prevented any of the Leopards from achieving top 10 individual finishes, jackrabbits are completely irrelevant in team scoring. But it made our boys seem as if they were running behind when Lovejoy was actually running away with the team title.

As the Cumulative Scores chart on the left shows, Lovejoy was actually in 3rd place after the #2 runners had finished for each of the top 4 teams, and Wakeland was sitting pretty in 1st place. But senior Grant Tiff (15:52.63, 7th in team scoring) and sophomore Brett Pedersen (16:00.00 flat, 11th in team scoring) had set up the rest of the Leopard pack for the kill. This is where Lovejoy's excellence in depth can't be beat. When super frosh Brady Laboret (16:03.26, 12th in team scoring) came across the finish line it was the beginning of the end for the competition. At that point Lovejoy took over 1st place, and the margin of victory only got wider as junior Ryan Brands (16:09.22, 13th in team scoring) and junior Mr. Bradley Davis (16:13.14, 16th in team scoring) locked up the 1st place hardware. For good measure, junior Ryan Spruell (16:17.83, 18th in team scoring) put 6 Lovejoy runners under 16:20 and gave Lovejoy 6 runners in the top-20 for team scoring. Good luck trying to beat that. Senior Nate Hartter (17:15.76, 76th in team scoring) had a nice run. He now has bragging rights around the Hartter household — his older brother Evan's State times were 18:00.73 in 2011, and 17:54.02 in 2012 (nowhere near what Nate turned in today — Nate, make sure Evan knows this).

Wakeland dropped to 3rd after their #3 finished, and fell off the podium completely after their #4 finished. Poor Wakeland also finished 4th in the 5A Girls Championship race. The team for Mercedes was particularly frustrated since their #1 and #2 finished 2nd and 3rd in team scoring, but then their #3 through #5 finished 58th, 69th, and 88th in team scoring, which knocked them down to 9th place. Ouch! At District and to some extent Region, the gaps between the #1 and #5 runners are not as big a deal. But at State where everyone is fast, sloppy split times are fatal because the gaps quickly fill with quality runners from opposing teams causing team scores to balloon.

Lovejoy had a phenomenal 1-5 split time today of only 20.51 seconds. That's the smallest by far that Lovejoy has ever accomplished at State. Also, Jake Hervey's Lovejoy record State time of 16:06.06 set back in 2010 fell big time: today Lovejoy's top 3 runners all turned in faster times. When told, Jake's father had this to say: "Wow!! That is fantastic!" Probably an understatement, but that's Lou Hervey for you. Lovejoy's team score of 59 today and margin of victory of 44 points also made a huge statement. Back in the years 2013 and prior the State Championship races only had 12 teams, so it was possible to score under 50. But then in 2014 the UIL increased the field size to 16 teams which significantly increased the team scores across the board and made low split times an absolute must. It will be a while before another school has a 44-point margin of victory in a 5A State Championship race.
[results]

Two of our senior boys ran their last XC race today wearing Lovejoy black & red. Nate Hartter is simply Lovejoy's most courageous cross country runner ever. Steve Prefontaine once said "A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more." While most runners strive to hit empty on their main and reserve tanks just as they cross the finish line, Nate always finished with about -10% in his reserve tank. He never, ever held back. Great success in life is about putting it all on the line every time out no matter what the obstacles. That's Nate. It will be fun to check on him in about 20 years to see how far he has gone. I suspect it will be much, much farther than the 7,000+ miles he has put in as a Lovejoy cross country runner.

Grant Tiff. The quiet man. No talk, all action, and what action he has displayed out on the cross country course over the past 4 seasons. No runner in LHS XC history has so unsettled the competition with his stealthful excellence. He has led the Boys Varsity squad for 3 years straight. He has Lovejoy's best time at State (15:52.63). Grant also joins a very select group of Lovejoy harriers who have run District, Region, and State for all 4 years at LHS. Sustained excellence is the hardest thing to achieve, but Grant has made it look far too easy obscuring his great dedication and effort. Grant has a terrific blend of athletic talent and mental focus that should serve him well at the next level. SFA is lucky to have him. It will be a pleasure to follow his future accomplishments.

In retrospect, the only unfortunate part about the 2016 campaign is that so many deserving JV runners could not run at Region and State. With Grant and Nate moving on, at least 2 of them will get that opportunity next fall. Can't wait — it'll be another barn burner with the girls again pushing for a team trip to State. But let's savor this one for a while. Savor long, savor happy.

Click here for the meet photo album.

Boys Team: As I said Donna North is expected to finish high in the standings. A common opponent for the season is Coppell. Both North and Coppell raced at McNeil. In that race, Coppell had their first finisher (Simms) in front of North's top runner De La Cruz by a solid margin. At the Southlake meet a week later, we put 3 guys in front of Simms, who ran a time right where his season average has been. So that being said we would like to put 3-4 guys in front of Donna North's number 1. Logan, Carly and I feel like we can put our top 5 in the top 15 and 7 in top 25 or better (team scoring, not including individuals). On the individual side, we are hoping to get at least a couple of our guys in the top 10. Saturday is Grant's birthday so we are hoping for another solid performance for him. If we can do that I feel like Saturday will be another good day in Round Rock for Lovejoy.

What to Look for in the Races:

For guys we want to be more aggressive at the start and be grouped up near the front by the 1 mile mark. We need to make sure we maintain contact and keep our footing through mile 2 which is filled with turns by the old course start line. For the 3rd mile we will be looking to surge, stay together, and close out the race over the last 800m. I feel like Carson needs to run a similar race. Get out and get position in the top 25% of the field in the first mile. Maintain that position for the 2nd mile, then use her strength, which is her strength, to surge and close out mile 3. The weather looks to be a non factor this year ... so the course should be in good shape and fast.

Itinerary:

• Friday:
• 7:30 - 9:00am: Team breakfast at Tiff's
• 9:00am: Depart
• 11:00am: Arrive at Hillsboro to stretch legs/Nike outlet
• 12:30pm: Lunch in Waco
• 3:00pm: Arrive at Hotel (La Quinta Inn/2004 North I-35/1-512-255-6666)
• 3:30pm: Leave hotel for course study/shakeout
• 5:00pm; back at hotel
• 7:00pm: Dinner at Buca Di Beppo Cedar Park
• 9:00pm: Team meeting
• 10:00pm: Lights out
• Saturday:
• 6:30am: Wakeup/breakfast
• 7:30am: Leave hotel for course
• 9:40am: 5A Girls State Cross Country Championships
• 10:20am: 5A Boys State Cross Country Championships
• Lunch at Rudy's in Round Rock after awards
• 5:00pm: Estimate arrival back at LHS

Signing Day:

Grant Tiff will be signing with Stephen F Austin today at 3:30 pm in the main gym. All are welcome to come celebrate 4 years of hard work.

Have a great rest of your week — please let me know if you have any questions,

Greg

Carson Hockersmith qualified out to the STATE meet after she literally gave EVERYTHING she had to cross that line! This girl has come far in a short period of time as she came off of a stress fracture and didn't race until mid-season! She ran a smart race, and it paid off for her! STATE BOUND!

Sophia Estes placed 31st overall, and she was the 15th individual! (top 10 individuals advance to State ... she was 5 away!) What an awesome accomplishment for this youngster! She got out tough and worked her way up. Her confidence in racing has really improved, and it showed at the Region meet!

Prior to the race, I told the girls they should be shooting for top 35 ... Emily Gueller was 39th ... almost reaching that goal. She had a tremendous season. I can't wait to see what she does next year as a Senior leader!

Avery, Lacey, and Andee raced well, and I think they will learn from this experience. It's tough to run in a race that is so important and intense ... where every athlete there is running for the same goal ... getting to State. These 3 will be HUGE next season ... and I am super pumped to watch them continue to grow throughout the track season!!

Shaelyn ran through some tough foot pain, and we are proud of her for finishing up a great career at Lovejoy! She provided words of wisdom throughout the season for the young bunch.

Noelle Franz ... she did not race Saturday ... but this girl has impressed me MASSIVELY this year. In her first ever Cross Country season, she made a huge impact on this team. It takes a lot to get a hurdler/sprinter to get out of their comfort zone and compete in Cross. Noelle did it though ... and she made the transition look easy. Just wish we had her another year!!!

I want give a huge shout-out to a few runners who attended the meet as well. Lily, Evie, Gracie, Noelle, and Heidi were helping count runners and encourage our girls and boys throughout the races. They were supportive, loud, and full of enthusiasm for both our boys and girls team. Another big thanks goes to Bryce Gournay, Camille Hendrix, Paula Delfin, Allison Jobes, Reagan Raeforth, and Hannah Ortega. These ladies took time out of their Saturday to make the trek to Grand Prairie simply to support their teammates. AMAZING. They held signs. They cheered. They screamed. I was so proud of the teammates that they were, and I believe this speaks VOLUMES about the program we have here at Lovejoy. Great kids.

Links to the meet:

• Boys Recap: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/10/29/region-ii-5a-xc-champs/
• Girls Recap: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/10/29/hockersmith-state-bound/
• Region II Results: http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=9918
• XC Program History Page on the Athletics website has been updated: http://lovejoyathletics.com/hq/xc-program-history/ (If you see a mistake please let Coach Kelly know)

Carly Littlefield

Carly, Logan and I all agree that yesterday exceeded our expectations. We felt like the girls ran as well as they could yesterday and as a result we had our best team performance in recent years and qualified Carson out to the State meet (almost getting Sofia out too). The guys followed that up with, as I overheard one Wakeland parent say after the awards, "that was dominating". The guys tallied up 41 points (which turned out to be the low number of the day as The Woodlands boys and Southlake Girls both scored 41 at their Region meets) and placed 4 in the top 10.

Girls Race:

We felt like Carson would have a great shot to qualify out as the top of the race would be team heavy. She learned from her mistake last year and ran a near perfect race by settling in and moving up through the back 1/2 of the race to finish up in 14th place. She was followed by freshman Sofia Estes who also ran a perfect race. She narrowly missed out on qualifying as an individual as well. Then our pack of Emily, Avery, Lacey, Shaelyn, and Andee followed them in with all having good days. From where I was on the course, when they came past me on the 2nd loop it was hard to calculate, but I thought we were in the mix. As it turned out we definitely were. A 6th place finish at this Region meet (I would say the toughest Region for qualifying because you have the top 2 teams in the State, followed by a 6A school who dropped down) is definitely a finish to be proud of. We had a couple of the girls fight through some pain on the course and did their best for the team ... and in the end tally, our best finish at Regions in 4 years. The girls beat teams who have been ranked all season in the top 10 like The Colony and Burleson Centinnial ...

Boys Race:

This was about the most complete race I have seen our guys run all year, and it still wasn't the best from them I feel. By that I mean yes they went out and "dominated" the field. We had a final tally of 41 points, with the next closest team, Wakeland at 116. But had they got out and set up closer to the front earlier on in the race, it would've been even more dominating and Grant wouldn't have had to play catch up the whole way. We will correct that in 2 weeks. But overall we as coaches were very pleased from what we saw from the guys. Grant, Brady, Brett, and Bradley (Bradley is another example of a kid who only wants everything handed to him and is only interested in himself ... ha ha) all in the top 10 at a 5A Region meet is quite a feat ... when you have the defending State Champion in the race along with several other noted programs like Poteet/HP/The Colony. Ryan Brands finished up with a solid race in 16th giving us our scoring 5 in the top 20 ... with Spruell at 23. Nathan had a rough go of it yesterday, but again showed how kids today aren't interested in working hard, or trying to build a program ... right !!!!

It would be difficult at this point to single out anyone who had a notable day, as at that level, everyone has to for the team to succeed, but I feel Bradley Davis did something I have never seen done before. Orchestrating a benefit race on the morning of a Cross Country Regional (when we decided on the date earlier this year, UIL had published the race date as Oct 31 for Region ... then changed). Then with the help of Carey Tiff, scoots to the meet and runs a seasons best time of 16:23 finishing in the top 10. Pretty cool stuff. The DMN has a story on it in their Region recap — with a few mis-stated facts ...

From here we will get back to work and prepare for the State meet. But I want to note that Sr. Shaelyn Ballard ran her last race as a Leopard yesterday. She has been a staple of the program ever since as a 4th grader she would show up to summer workouts to run as her brother Grant was on the team. She will be missed ...

Thank you to all the parents and administrators who made the trip out to the meet for support ... watch for Carly and Logan's email report for a more specific breakdown along with Jim's recap and photos on the team website.

With much appreciation,

Greg

The weather was much warmer today than usual — more typical of the Gerald Richey than Region. A slight breeze keep the spectators comfortable, but hydration was a priority. The heat slowed down the times noticeably.

Many of the Lovejoy XC runners not on the Region squad took part in the Running Over Depression 5K held at Lovejoy HS this morning and hosted by junior Mr. Bradley Davis as his Eagle Scout project. It was a great run according the the JV runners who participated, and yet allowed them plenty of time to make it to Region for the 12:00 pm start of the first 5A race.

Lovejoy ISD Athletic Director Puckett was also on hand to cheer on the Leopards and enjoy their success. It's always good to have Jim Bob in the house.

The Varsity Girls punctuated their strongest season since 2011 finishing a solid 6th and missing a team trip to State by two places. The girls from Prosper, Frisco Liberty, Wakeland, and Highland Park are headed to State, while McKinney North and Lovejoy missed out. But Lovejoy's girls made great strides this year improving over last year's Region finish by 3 places. Sophomore Carson Hockersmith (12th in 19:49.96) did qualify as an individual competitor. Last year, Carson's 20:22.40 time fell short, but she left no doubt today. This will mark the 8th year in a row the girls will be represented at State. Freshman Sofia Estes (28th in 20:48.36) was only 4 spots away from qualifying as an individual herself. What a great performance by the freshman. Junior Emily Gueller (34th in 21:10.15) came in only 6 spots after Sofia. The girls were truly on the precipice today. Next came freshman Avery Silliman (45th in 21:18.35), then freshman Lacey Pelkowski (59th in 21:43.08), then senior Shaelyn Ballard (78th in 22:29.59), and finally freshman Andee Richardson (80th in 22:30.51). A great overall performance by such a young team only two of whom had prior Region experience. Shaelyn was noticeably limping in the latter stages of the race, and hers was the only do-over I would have wanted — a healthy final race for such a deserving senior. The girls can be very proud of their performance today.
[results]

Today marks the conclusion of two seniors XC careers at Lovejoy. Noelle Franz is a powerful and graceful runner. If you've never watched her run the 110M hurdles, you've missed something. Highly successful Track & Field sprinters/hurdlers typically aren't big on running cross country, and they certainly don't join their senior year. But we're very glad she did and admire the success she had, and what it meant to the team. Thank you, Noelle.

Shaelyn Ballard accomplished something no other Lovejoy girl runner has accomplished with her comeback this season. After almost 2 years of injuries and setbacks, Shaelyn got healthy, got into top shape, and made a huge contribution to this season's resurgence of the Varsity Girls. She not only turned in important times, she also provided much needed leadership to the Varsity pack out on the course. In previous cases a girl runner fighting successive injuries would either drop off the team or settle into a minor JV role. Over the years Lovejoy has lost so many valuable Varsity Girls to this pattern. But Shaelyn fought her way back and succeeded in making Lovejoy XC's greatest physical and mental comeback ever. And she's the only one to have ever done it. What drive.

The Varsity Boys dominated today, as they bested the other State qualifying teams from Wakeland, Dallas Conrad, and Poteet by a score of 41-116-123-160. In a 23-team field with 179 runners that's crazy good. Lovejoy's previous low score at Region for the Varsity Boys was a 66 set back in 2010 when the boys won their only other Region II Championship. The Varsity Girls have posted two slightly lower scores back when Lovejoy was running 3A. But nobody scores a 41 in a 5A Region Championship — the field is too large and the competition is too strong, especially in Region II. In the table below, note how the Region scores have gone up as Lovejoy has advanced to the 4A and 5A levels.

The boys also placed 4 runners in the top 10 today — that has only happened once before back in 2011 when the Varsity Girls finished 1-5-6-10-16-34-68 in a 3A Region Championship. Today the boys finished 4-5-7-9-16-22-56 at the 5A level. No wonder Coach C says this season's boys are his best ever.

The pack was much tighter today with senior Grant Tiff (4th in 16:16.74) leading the charge, and very closely followed by freshman Brady Laboret (5th in 16:19.83), junior Mr. Bradley Davis (7th in 16:23.19), sophomore Brett Pedersen (9th in 16:24.29), junior Ryan Brands (16th in 16:39.81), junior Ryan Spruell (22nd in 16:51.47), and finally senior Nate Hartter (56th in 17:55.43). That's 4 runners under 16:30 and in the top 10, 6 runners under 17:00 and in the top 22, and a 1-5 split time of 23.07 — no, really! The coaches mentioned something about our pack demoralizing the opposing schools. They did. The Highland Park coaches were probably relieved to see that their boys had not faltered at District, but rather that Lovejoy is just that good.

But State is looming, so the real celebration will have to wait a couple weeks.
[results]

Click here for the meet photo album.

Individually they qualify out the top 10 girls not on a qualifying team. Carson will be in the mix for that if our girls do not advance as a team. We could potentially see several of our girls in that situation as the Region is top heavy on team scoring and not too many individuals will be in the top places.

Girls Lineup:

• Carson Hockersmith
• Avery Silliman
• Sofia Estes
• Emily Gueller
• Shaelyn Ballard
• Lacey Pelkowski
• Andee Richardson
• Noelle Franz (#1 alternate)

Boys Race:

Our boys are running better than they have all season. All are healthy and looking forward to Saturday. We have raced most all the strong teams in our Region already and no one has provided much of a challenge. I expect there to be someone to rise up and have great days. We will be fine if we go out on the course and execute the race plan, and all the guys run to their level of training. We all had strong races on the course back in September and I expect our times to have dropped about 15-20 seconds on Saturday. We are hoping to have all of our top 7 under 17:00 and our scoring 5 under 16:30. Logan has talked to them about being race ready and not take anything for granted. We have to go out and do it on race day.

I would expect the biggest challenges from the schools in our Conference. Poteet, HP and Frisco Wakeland should be the schools who have the best chances to qualify out behind us.

Individually Grant should be in the mix for the Region II title as he will battle Adamson's Armendariz again. They are 1-1 so far this season. I look to have all our scorers in the top 15.

Boys Lineup:

• Grant Tiff
• Brady Laboret
• Brett Pedersen
• Ryan Spruell
• Ryan Brands
• Bradley Davis
• Nathan Hartter
• Will Muirhead (#1 Alternate)

Team Picnic:

After the awards, we will have a team picnic at the team camp. I imagine they will be pretty hungry by then so we would ask the team to provide their own lunches, for a picnic instead of going to a restaurant. It's supposed to be a nice day so weather shouldn't be an issue.

Have a great rest of your week,

Greg

Here are the Career PR's set on District Day for the ladies! (click here for the results of all athletes competing this season).

• Avery Silliman - 20:38 - Not only breaking the 21 minute barrier for the first time ... but SHATTERING it and taking the JVG District Title. It was a huge day for this young lady!
• Sofia Estes - 20:50 - Breaking 21 minutes for the first time and earning ALL DISTRICT HONORS by placing 7th ... as a freshman!
• Paula Delfin - 23:00 came on VERY strong here at the end of the year! She is proof that continuous hard work pays off!
• Camille Hendrix - 24:22
• Hannah Ortega - 24:25 - nearly 1 minute off of her previous PR!!!
• Lauren Motsney - 24:28 - over 1 minute faster!
• Madeline Sanders - 24:44
• Haylie Peschke - 24:44
• Meredith Ehlmann - 24:44 - PR after having a bad ankle injury most of the season.
• Camille Morgello - 25:32
• Alaina Pierce - 25:33
• Bryce Gournay - 26:23 - over a 1 minute PR!!!
• Allison Jobes - 28:11

Full Results can be found here: http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=10278

Region Outlook

Saturday is a very big day for girls who are racing. Prosper and Liberty have been running strong all year and will most likely take the top two spots as a team. There will be many teams looking to grab those last 2 spots ... and we will be one of those! We will need to come in ready to race fast and compete with a ton of heart. We will be trying to defeat Wakeland, The Colony, McKinney North, Highland Park, and Burleson Centennial ... to name a few.

Have a fantastic week!

Carly Littlefield

The JV boys team won the District Title for the 10th year in a row with a total of 19 points! Will Muirhead claimed the individual title with a time of 17:24. Lovejoy had a total of 8 runners in the top 10 for the JV Boys division — Grant Gueller (3rd, 17:38), Michael O’Brien (4th, 17:39), Trevor Joiner (5th, 17:39), Christian Sutter (6th, 17:39), Chayden DuBois (8th, 17:51), Whit Bedell (9th, 17:56), and William Godfrey (10th, 18:00).

Our JV team ran exceptionally well on Friday breaking barriers and setting new career personal best times! It was awesome to see some guys break 18 minutes for the first time and crack the 20-minute barrier!

• Grant Gueller - 17:38
• Trevor Joiner – 17:39
• Michael O’Brien – 17:39 – First time under 18 min! – Big improvement!
• Chayden DuBois – 17:51 – First time under 18 min!
• Whit Bedell – 17:56 – First time under 18 min and just a freshman!
• Collin Jones – 19:05
• Erik Day – 19:18
• Sam Rouse – 19:19
• Jason Abernathy – 19:43 – First time under 20 Min – has come a long way over three years in the program!
• Sam Mena – 19:45 – First time under 20 Min barrier!
• Chris Dunn – 19:58 – First time under 20 Min Barrier – over a 6 min improvement since he started last year!
• Shalin Mehta – 20:00 – So close to breaking 20 min!
• Travis Sipes – 20:36
• Matthew Sipes – 20:58 – first time under 21 min!
• Alex Ferko – 23:00
• Elijah Chapman – 25:32 – Big improvement from his first race at Southlake!

Full Results can be found here: http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=10278

Meet Recap can be found here: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/10/22/lovejoy-xc-regional-bound-10-years-in-a-row/

Click here for Race Results Recap from the entire season.

Region Outlook:

Our top 12 boys throughout this season will continue to train going forward (Brands, Tiff, Laboret, Pedersen, Spruell, Hartter, Davis, Joiner, Sutter, Gueller, Muirhead, Godfrey). The Region II Championship is on Saturday 10/29/16 at Lynn Creek Park in Grand Prairie. The girls will race at 12pm and the boys race at 12:30pm. Last time we raced at this course many of our Varsity runners had their best race of the season. I expect us to have another great race on Saturday beating those times.

Region competition to look out for will be Frisco Wakeland, Mansfield Summit, Dallas Conrad, and Highland Park. Many teams will be fighting for one of four spots to qualify for the state meet and teams will bring their A-game. I feel confident that we will advance to the state meet and hopefully re-gain the Region II Title. The boys have not won a Regional Championship since 2010 and I know our boys want to win.

Our boys team has 6 boys who can consistently run sub 17 minutes — I have not seen another team who is able to do that as of yet at the 5A level — that is a testament of our team's depth.

Spectators will be charged $10 per vehicle to enter the park.

Going Forward:

Those not advancing to the regional meet we encourage you to sign up for Bradley's 5K that will take place this Saturday at Lovejoy High School. Running Over Depression — sign up here:
https://secure.getmeregistered.com/get_information.php?event_id=125009

We will talk to the team tomorrow about the game plan going forward. Those running in the 5K it would be best to keep training through this week. Once the XC season is over for a runner we allow them to take one week off from running and the second week run every other day. This allows for runners to take a mental and physical break from a long training season — and this break is needed. Even professional runners take a short period off from training once a season ends. After the time off the base mileage begins again to prepare for the track season and most of the base phase takes place during November — January.

Running is a continuous cycle and to be great at it training through to the track season if vital for that success. Runners enter another level of training during track and they will see their times and speed improve and that will carry over into the summer months that will prepare them for cross country next year.

With our team's depth this year, Greg and I only see our team getting stronger next year. If everyone is willing to stick with the program, I can foresee our boys team having 10-12 boys that can run sub 17 minutes next year. That would be a scary thing for a program of any size but especially for a 5A program.

Running Over Depression 5K Volunteer Meeting:

Bradly Davis will have a volunteer/planning meeting for his 5K this Tuesday in the LHS Lecture Hall at 7 PM. If you are available and willing to help please attend.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

Our LHS Harriers haven't performed this well at the District Level in years, and the last time Lovejoy secured all 4 individual championship titles was 2009. The table below lists the best individual performances over the years. Twice before our harriers have captured all 4 individual titles, but that was at the 3A level ...

It's interesting to note that our JV Boys have held both the team and individual District titles for many, many years now. And considering the JV Boys who are on that list this is not a surprise.

Before getting into the details of today's running, much praise is due to our spirit wear coordinators and coaches for the variety of cool togs our athletes were sporting today after the races and at the awards ceremony. Lovejoy provides great uniforms to compete in: comfortable, functional, eye-catching, avant-garde. But we really excel when it comes to spirit wear, warm ups, etc. The other District athletes combined couldn't come close to matching what our Leopards were decked out in. If the UIL gave out a trophy for the spiffiest XC team, Lovejoy would get the hardware. The assortment has been accumulating for about a decade now, and it all shone today. Looking over the awards photos, only two girls were wearing the same outfit in one of the photos. Everyone else — boys and girls — are celebrating attire diversity, and looking classy in the process. One of our girls was wearing a Lovejoy Volleyball tee shirt — nothing wrong with a shout out to Lovejoy's vertical girls. And one of our boys snuck in a Harvard tee shirt. Even our coaches don't wear anything similar. A JV Boy from another school was actually wearing a Lovejoy XC Fall Festival tee shirt when he went up to receive his medal. Our kids were clearly having fun, celebrating their success, being respectful, and looking great while doing it. It was fairly clear to the rest of the District that Lovejoy isn't just the winningest XC team in the District, it's also the most fun XC team. There may be something to that ... !!!

But back to the running.

The Varsity Girls only challenge today was Highland Park, as expected. And the Scots took 1st, but the very strong showing by Lovejoy in taking 2nd place made quite a statement. The Wylie East Raiders took 3rd. The top 3 teams finished with scores of 20-52-89, which says much for the Lady Leopards. Most impressive was the District 15-5A XC Varsity Girls champion from Lovejoy, sophomore Carson Hockersmith (20:10.2) who comfortably bested the HP pack behind her. HP fielded 90 girls today, but not one of them got close to Carson. She was followed a bit later by the scoring pack of freshman Sophia Estes (20:50.5, a top-10 finish at 7th overall), junior Emily Gueller (21:01.2, 11th overall), senior Shaelyn Ballard (21:13.2, 16th overall), freshman Lacey Pelkowski (21:13.9, 17th overall), freshman Andrea Richardson (21:20.7, 18th overall), and senior Noelle Franz (21:29.4, 21st overall). The 2-6 split time of 30.2 seconds was excellent for a championship race. The girls also looked relatively fresh after the race — none of the long, gaunt faces as in prior seasons that usually foretell lagging performances at Region. The girls look ready for the next stage.
[results]

The expectations for the Lovejoy Varsity Boys have been crushing this season. And no matter how well they perform, some err in thinking it's expected. But distance running is all about proving yourself daily. You're only as good as your last race. Our Varsity Boys never back away from the challenge of meeting and beating that expectation.

Today's race started with District 15-5A XC champion senior Grant Tiff (16:04.9) who did something Lovejoy hasn't accomplished since 2009 — he took the boys title. We've mentioned that Lovejoy hasn't won all 4 District individual titles since 2009, and the hold back has been the Boys Varsity title. Grant took care of that today. This season the boys have decimated the competition with their pack running and they did so again today. Grant had a 23.6 second lead on the pack, but then it came in fast and furious: freshman Brady Laboret (16:26.5, 3rd overall), sophomore Brett Pedersen (16:27.8, 4th overall), junior Mr. Bradley Davis (16:46.3, 8th overall), and an ever-improving junior Ryan Spruell (16:53.4, 10th overall) gave Lovejoy 5 runners in the top 10 of a 5A District championship. Crazy good. As exclamations points, in came junior Ryan Brands (16:57.2, 11th overall), and senior Nate Hartter (17:30.7, 17th overall) putting all Lovejoy runners in the top one-third of the field. Can't beat that, and none of the other teams came close to doing so with the top three team scores settling at 26-58-59.
[results]

The JV Girls had to contend with 83 HP runners, and were not deterred. Yes HP took 1st as a team, but their success was bitter sweet with Lovejoy freshman Avery Silliman (20:38.3) easily winning the JV Girls District individual title. The only possible negative of the day was the 2:03.1 gap between Avery and the scoring pack. They were led in by sophomore Gracie Turner (22:41.4, 10th in scoring), who was followed by freshman Heidi Fischer (22:58.7, 12th in scoring), freshman Paula Delfin (23:00.7, 13th in scoring), and sophomore Summer George (23:09.6, 15th in scoring). The #6 and #7 runners today were senior Hallie Fischer (23:17.3, 16th in scoring), and sophomore Emma Satterwhite (23:41.6, 19th in scoring). A very solid 2nd place finish with the top three scores at 20-51-104.
[results]

This was Hallie's last XC race for the Leopards, and her stately manner has helped turn the girls program around. When Hallie started, the girls were headed into a bit of a trough after the graduation of the vaunted Class of 2012 and then Katie Ruhala. But now the girls are back on the precipice, and Hallie's leadership has been key in turning things around. Thank you, Ms. Fischer.

As always, we saved the best for last — the JV Boys monster truck rally. Lovejoy crushed a lot of would-be 4x4's today. The only real suspense was whether Lovejoy's JV Boys would score a perfect 15 points. Alas they did not, as a lone HP runner broke up the Leopard pack pushing the Leopards' score up to 19 points — but still the best team score of the day for any of the races. Lovejoy did crunch down 8 of the top 10 finishes: District 15-5A JV Boys XC champion freshman Will Muirhead (17:24.9), freshman Grant Guellar (17:38.1, 3rd overall), sophomore Michael O'Brien (17:39.0, 4th overall), junior Trevor Joiner (17:39.7, 5th overall), junior Christian Sutter (17:39.8, 6th overall), and sophomore Chayden DuBois (17:51.9, 8th overall). Top 10 finishes were also turned in by freshman Whit Bedell (17:56.5), and sophomore William Godfrey (18:00.6). There were many more great performances today. The Leopards bested 2nd and 3rd place finishers HP and Mesquite Poteet by a score of 19-55-68. Not close at all. If the coaches had rested the entire 7-boy Varsity squad, and run the top 7 JV runners in their stead, then Lovejoy would still have qualified for Region. Well done, fellas.
[results]

Another senior deserving recognition is Josh Luck who completed his Lovejoy XC career today. My favorite runners are the ones who get after it and stay after it through their high school careers. It's not so much about medals and trophies, but rather being a part of a team that's so much greater than just a sum of individual athletes. The 2016 edition of Lovejoy XC is amazingly young — only 8 seniors. So having guys like Josh around to balance the youth is a big plus. Thank you, Josh.

Click here for the meet photo album.

They continued to improve and drop their times at the meet last Saturday. The majority of the ladies had a season PR, or a time that was very near what they've run so far this season. We are drawing closer to the District and Regional meets ... and like I keep telling them ... it just takes ONE GREAT RACE to attain their goals for the season. Anything can happen when they're pulling for each other and come together in the right moment. They have continued to get better each meet ... so I am confident in what they will do in the next two races.

Despite the muddy conditions and narrow course — we still had some runners PR on this course — very impressive! Runners that set a new PR include Lacey Pelkowski, Sofia Estes, Noelle Franz, Lauren Motsney, Madeline Sanders, and Bryce Gournay. Shaelyn and Carson both ran their PR's so far this season, and Emily had a race just short of last week's PR, which shows she's comfortable in the mid 20's now. I'm looking for her to break that 20 minute barrier before the season ends! Full results can be found here:
http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=10219

Carly Littlefield

Despite the muddy conditions and narrow course — we still had some runners PR on this course — very impressive! Runners that set a new PR include Michael O’Brien 18:05, Whit Bedell 18:20, Thomas Michal 18:50, Kyle Easely 19:21, Colin Jones 19:31, Sam Mena 20:14, Shalin Mehta 20:29, Chris Dun 20:42, and Jason Abernathy 20:48. Full results can be found here: http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=10219

NO Weight Training:

NO more weight training for the remainder of the XC season leading up to the State Meet. This time of the year we want the runners as rested and feeling as fresh as possible. We will still continue core workouts at the start of each practice but no more waking up early for weights going into the championship races.

Grades:

Reminder that the grading period ends this Friday! Make sure all assignments and any re-takes are taken care of this week. Athletes must be passing all classes to be eligible to compete in the district meet. Only AP classes and Pre Cal are exempt courses.

Practice on Friday:

Friday is an early release day and also Leopard Friday. We will Practice at 6:45 AM on Friday at Celebration Park. Warm Up will start at 6:45 AM. Once we complete the workout athletes can ride the bus and shower at the school for those who need that accommodation.

Cross Country and Track will have a tent/booth set up for the Leopard Friday festivities in the courtyard area. Please stop by and say hello if you are around.

Hotel for State XC Meet:

I have received a few emails asking about the hotel we will be staying at for the State Meet. We will be staying at the following:

La Quinta Round Rock North
2004 North Interstate 35
Round Rock, TX 78681

Running Over Depression 5K:

Those not competing in the Regional Meet are encouraged to support Bradley Davis’ Eagle Scout project on October 29th — Running Over Depression 5K. It will be held at Lovejoy High School. Register here:
https://secure.getmeregistered.com/get_information.php?event_id=125009

Once completed make the trip over to Grand Prairie to watch the boys and girls teams compete in the Region II 5A Championships.

Booster Membership:

If you have not yet joined the booster club please consider doing so. We strive to have 100% participation from all families. Click here for the form.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

The weather was perfect for running, with some residual dampness and mud on the course from the previous day's heavy rains. The course itself was non-descript — flat and boring. The field was less crowded than one would have imagined for a Southlake Carroll meet. But the competition was meaningful and challenging.

The coaches surgically split the squad into 7-runner Varsity squads, and then further divided the remaining runners into two JV squads for both the boys and girls races. Overall there was some holdback in the performances, with not many PRs set. After three straight weekends of racing, the legs are in for some needed rest before District.

The Varsity Girls looked solid again finishing 12th in a 28-team race. Prosper, The Colony, and McKinney North are the notable 5A teams finishing ahead of Lovejoy in this race. Our girls averaged 20:46 for their top 5 with a 1-5 split time of 1:21. Sophomore Carson Hockersmith (29th overall) gets better every race. She finished under 20 minutes at 19:49.49 — a big milestone for the team, especially considering she ran the Open 10K at the Chile pepper the weekend before. Junior Emily Gueller finished #2 at 20:40.35. Then came freshman Sofia Estes at #3 in 21:05.36. Senior Shaelyn Ballard was close behind and #4 at 21:08.82. Shaelyn also ran the Open 10K at the Chile Pepper. Shadowing Shaelyn was freshman Lacey Pelkowski (#5 at 21:09.91). The final two Lovejoy runners were close behind: senior Noel Franz (21:12.24) and freshman Andrea Richardson (21:24.59). The 2-6 split time was only 25.01 seconds, so the girls are continuing to run well as a pack with Carson out front. They look primed for the District meet.
[results]

The Varsity Boys should have won their race, but 6A El Paso Americas kind of snuck past them. While Lovejoy was looking to beat Southlake Carroll, which it did, El Paso Americas was apparently after the Leopards. As Coach C put it, "We really weren't looking for them [El Paso], and their uniforms are so plain we didn't notice them." Chalk one up for stealth. But 'tis better to lose in style than ... , well enough Shakespeare. As a reminder, Lovejoy bested El Paso Americas at the XC Fall Festival by a slim 4 points. Anyway, the Varsity Boys finished a close 2nd and far ahead of 3rd place Southlake Carroll and the rest of the 34-team field which notably included Allen, Plano West, Coppell, Aledo, McKinney North, and The Colony.

Senior Grant Tiff was again #1 in 16:12.35 and 5th overall. After 3 straight weekends of racing, a sub 16-minute time probably wasn't realistic. The pack was even farther back with a 12.25-second delay before we saw sophomore Brett Pedersen (20th overall, 16:25.60) and freshman Brady Laboret (21st overall, 16:25.72). Shortly thereafter junior Ryan Brands (33rd overall, 16:55.77) and junior Mr. Bradley Davis (35th overall, 16:57.14) closed the book on Lovejoy scoring. Junior Ryan Spruell (17:17.55) continues to look healthier, and the coaches expect him to be completely recovered for District. Overall 256 runners finished the race, so the boys' finishing spots certainly look respectable. The 44-second 1-5 split time looks good when you consider how far out in front Grant can get. The order of finish was 5-20-21-32-33-68-94.
[results]

The organizers collapsed the Varsity races, so Lovejoy's second set of runners had to run in the 6A JV races. The JV Girls Black squad finished 4th in a 17-team race with an average time of 22:47.50. Impressive. Sophomore Avery Silliman (22:13.78) led followed by sophomore Gracie Turner (22:34.02), freshman Heidi Fischer (22:48.87), freshman Lily McCutcheon (23:06.97), and senior Hallie Fischer (23:13.85). Junior Autumn Purcell (46th overall, 23:52.00) and sophomore Emma Satterwhite (48th overall, 23:52.15) put all 7 Lovejoy girls in the top 50 of a 263-runner race amongst some very competitive teams. Great results.
[results]

The JV Boys Black squad was at full strength today with the Varsity races limited to 7 runners. The result was crushing — a score of 25 points in a 6A JV race with 19-team field. Truly gangster. The boys bested Keller Timber Creek and Southlake Carroll by a score of 25-53-54. None of the other teams broke 100. Lovejoy's order of finish was 1-3-5-6-10-14-23: freshman Will Muirhead (17:21.54), junior William Godfrey (17:40.21), junior Christian Sutter (17:52.67), freshman Grant Guellar (17:57.91), junior Trevor Joiner (18:01.22), sophomore Michael O'Brien (18:05.68), and freshman Whit Bedell (18:20.72). The guys had a nice 39-second split time. Can't wait to see these guys back in action again at District.
[results]

The JV Girls Red squad finished 4th in a 10-team 5A JV race against some teams who had all of their JV runners consolidated into this one race, such as Prosper. A very solid showing by the girls. WSMS 8th grader Amelia Carothers (23rd overall, 24:14.94) led and was almost 33 seconds out in front of the scoring pack of freshman Madeline Sanders (24th overall, 24:47.72), freshman Haylie Peschke (26th overall, 25:00.55), sophomore Summer George (30th overall, 25:20.92), and freshman Lauren Motsney (36th overall, 25:51.16). Good job.
[results]

The JV Boys Red squad put 25 runners in a 148-runner race finishing 3rd overall. Freshman Thomas Michal (7th overall, 18:50.40) and WSMS runner Alex Pedersen (13th overall, 19:02.18) were out in front of the pack. Then the freshmen trio of Kyle Easley (22nd overall, 19:21.92), Erik Day (24th overall, 19:29.56) and Brendan Dunleavy (27th overall, 19:32.56) completed the scoring, and were followed closely by Sam Rouse (33rd overall, 19:44.82). A great finish to a run of 6 consecutive well-run races by Lovejoy. Phew — time to rest up for District.
[results]

Click here for the meet photo album.

Full results and recap for the meet can be found here: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/10/01/lovejoy-xc-runs-in-arkansas/

Cindy George, Summer's mom, was able to capture some great photos from the Chili Pepper meet and those can be found here:
https://onedrive.live.com/?authkey=%21AkH4pHEnRU8xmZE&id=A41246D10368DB40%21454&cid=A41246D10368DB40

Logan also tweeted out several photos and short video clips during the meet on Saturday and those can be found at @lovejoyxctf on Twitter

Thank you to all those who did not run in the Chile Pepper meet and attended the workout on Friday morning! Those workouts are key to each runners improvement!

This Week and Looking Ahead

This week we will enter the "speed" phase of our training. We will begin 800M repeats on Wednesday and TxMileSplit.com will be back on site to cover our workout. Last time the film crew visited, their footage and cameras were stolen the next day, and they unfortunately lost everything ... but the good news is that we get to have them back again!

On Saturday, October 8th, we will travel to the Dragon XC Invitational hosted by Southlake Carroll. The meet will be held at Bob Jones Park in Southlake, TX. We will only be able to enter 7 varsity runners for this meet in varsity divisions. For the Southlake meet, the top 7 girls will run Varsity 5A and under, and the remaining runners will compete in the 5A & under JV division. We will send out entries for each division on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week. Coach C will also email out departure times for this meet.

Grades:

Any athlete not passing all classes except for AP classes or Pre Cal will not be eligible to run. I believe we have all runners eligible and will be fine. Reminder that grades will need to remain passing until the end of Lovejoy's grading period on October 14th to remain eligible to compete in the District meet and beyond.

Carly Littlefield

Training Week Ahead:

Milesplit will be with us again on Wednesday for a workout Wednesday series. This week we will be doing repeat 800's so they should get a lens full of some good work being done by the group.

RWTL:

We have our 2nd installment of Reading With The Leopards this Friday at 7:30am @Hart Elementary.

Letter Jackets:

Fittings for new Letter Jacket orders will be next Wednesday. Coach Littlefield and Coach Kelly will get their lists of new Letter awardees by Friday of this week.

Thank You's:

I so appreciate all the parents who made this past weekend possible by shuttling your athletes to Fayetteville/to dinner/to race course/and safely back home. If this was your first trip, I hope you saw the value in the trip and why we do it each fall season. I feel the kids get so much out of it and its beneficial for us to have that small group one-on-one meeting the night before. I think especially on the girls side, with the number of PR's set, you can see they benefit too. And it was cool to get to see Abby Tedford run in her first race for Arkansas in uniform ... we are very proud of her ... !!!!

Run Happy Run Long

Greg

This Week and Looking Ahead:

This week we will enter the "speed" phase of our training. We will begin 800M repeats on Wednesday and TxMileSplit.com will be back on site to cover our workout. Last time the film crew visited their footage and cameras were stolen the next day and they unfortunately lost everything....

On Saturday, October 8th, we will travel to the Dragon XC Invitational hosted by Southlake Carroll. The meet will be held at Bob Jones Park in Southlake, TX. We will only be able to enter 7 varsity runners for this meet in varsity divisions. I like this because it will help our teams know that there are only 7 guys and that is the way it will be for District, Region, and State. For the Southlake meet I will enter 7 in the 6A Varstiy Boys division, 7 in the 5A & under Varsity Boys division, and the remaining runners will compete in the 5A & under JV division. We will send out entries for each division on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week. Coach C will also email out departure times for this meet. We all know that Southlake has a very solid 6A team but I feel confident that we can place at least 2nd in this meet and give Southlake a run for their money and break up their team with our runners.

Grades

Grades will be released Monday morning at 8 AM. Any athlete not passing all classes except for AP classes or Pre Cal will not be eligible to run. I believe we have all runners eligible and will be fine. Reminder that grades will need to remain passing until the end of Lovejoy's grading period on October 14th to remain eligible to compete in the District meet and beyond.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

Our girls also ran well and now we see where we are in relation to the rest of the Region and catching up to Prosper, Liberty, The Colony, HP, and Wakeland. Coach Littlefield is very astute in getting teams to pull together, and I believe she will once again do a great job in getting these girls in contention at Regionals. Carson had a very solid race. I told her going in all I wanted her to do was beat HP's top 2 girls and she did. Shaelyn also ran well and I feel like this meet is going to springboard our girls into the next phase of workouts.

Chile Pepper:

The team is in the process of organizing their rides. By tomorrow afternoon we will see where we are and get everything hammered out. All athletes should be registered for their races by now.

New Training Phase:

We are now entering a new training phase, one which will be geared more for speed development on top of their aerobic base. We will be doing shorter/faster reps while still keeping our mileage up. This phase will last up to the District meet, and then we start to rest up and really get fast ... !!!! It's very exciting ... !!!

Run Happy Run Long

Greg

Meet Recap:

The course at Myers Park is one of the toughest courses our runners will experience this year, and it will also be the host site to our District Championship on October 21st. See the attachment for a season summary of races results – you will see that we had several runners that ran a PR yesterday!

I would like to specifically mention a few girls who really surprised and impressed me yesterday. Lacey Pelkowski has come a long way this year ... she has always been a 200/400 girl in track. She has stepped outside of her comfort zone this year in Cross, and she ran number 4 for the squad on Saturday as her race times continue to drop. Also, Heidi Fischer had a PR. She ran tough and medalled in the JV race, and I expect very big things from her in the future! Summer George has stayed consistent and strong in her training and racing, and Hannah Ortega is one to watch as her times continue to drop. Hannah works very hard in practice and always does the full workout. I have been very impressed with her tremendous attitude and desire to be the best runner she can be. I think freshman Madeline Sanders is also coming along! She has seemed to be picking it up in workouts, and her racing has been consistent.

More photos and videos can be found on tx.milesplit.com.
http://tx.milesplit.com/meets/242240/coverage#.V-hh0PArKhc

Official race results can be found here:
http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=9983

GRADES !!!

The majority of our kids are fine on grades but just a reminder that runners must be passing ALL classes by this FRIDAY in order to remain eligible with UIL rules. Athletes will also need to continue to pass ALL classes by the end of Lovejoy’s grading period to remain eligible with UIL. Those not eligible will not be able to race. Reminder AP classes and Pre Cal are the only exempt courses. Let me know if you have any questions about this.

Meet T-Shirts Available:

If you would still like a meet t-shirt for $15 we still have some Larges and XL's available. Let me know!

Chile Pepper XC Meet:

Greg will email out more details regarding this meet and trip this week.

Tempo this Friday — 7 AM at Celebration:

For runners not running at the Chile Pepper meet in Arkansas — we will work out on Friday morning as a team. We want to make sure runners get in our normal tempo run in on Friday morning as a team before us coaches travel to Arkansas. We will practice at 7 AM at Celebration Park on Friday. We should finish by 8 AM. Athletes needing a ride to the high school field house to shower can ride the bus over to the HS.

LLI Golf Tournament:

LLI golf tournament is on October 7th at Heritage Ranch. They are looking for players, sponsors, and raffle items. If you can help with any of these, please check out the flyer at www.lovejoyfootball.com/paypal.html or email Chad Broussard at ccb17@phoenjx-tx.com.

Carly Littlefield

There is a quote that I share often with our runners — "Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, and others make it happen." — Michael Jordan. There are a lot of programs and coaches who could only dream of hosting a meet of that size and quality of racing. I came to Lovejoy with hopes of growing our meet and providing the best possible experience like yesterday for runners. With all coaches, parents, and athletes working together we made that happen. There are also a lot of teams in the state who would like to qualify for state or who wish to win state. Greg has built a program over the years that has a history of having runners that make their wishes and dreams a reality through hard work, dedication, and consistency of training. Our boys and girls teams are in the process of making their dreams a reality this season. Now that we have our home meet out of the way it is time to make it happen. Only 7 weeks until the state meet! — I know some might have questioned if we could have pulled off hosting a meet of this size, but I think the success of our meet was a great example for our athletes that if we all work together towards a common goal we can do amazing things!

Meet Recap:

We had some great performances yesterday. The course at Myers Park is one of the toughest courses our runners will experience this year and it will also be the host site to our District Championship on October 21st. Click here for a season summary of races results — you will see that we had several runners that ran a PR yesterday!

Race recap is already posted on the booster website by Jim McGuinness as well as some photos from the meet. I will type up a race recap on the athletics website hopefully by tomorrow.

More photos and videos can be found on tx.milesplit.com.
http://tx.milesplit.com/meets/242240/coverage#.V-hh0PArKhc

Official race results can be found here:
http://mychiptime.com/searchevent.php?id=9983
For some reason not all of the JV results merged into milesplits network but I have emailed milesplit to let them know.

GRADES !!!

The majority of our boys are fine on grades but just a reminder that runners must be passing ALL classes by this FRIDAY in order to remain eligible with UIL rules. Athletes will also need to continue to pass ALL classes by the end of Lovejoy's grading period to remain eligible with UIL. Those not eligible will not be able to race. Reminder AP classes and Pre Cal are the only exempt courses. Let me know if you have any questions about this.

Meet T-Shirts Available:

If you would still like a meet t-shirt for $15 we still have some Larges and XL's available. Let me know!

Chile Pepper XC Meet:

Greg will email out more details regarding this meet and trip this week. Boy runners going on this trip need to register for the Open 10K. The boys team will run this meet as a progression workout and I will let the boys know how I would like for them to run this. We will NOT race this meet. Our boys team is running very well right now and we want to keep it that way — no need to be overly aggressive with their training and racing. We want to follow our plan of race, train, race, train race pattern. Trust the process and plan we have — we are running too well right now to race too much and derail the process. Athletes not going to the Arkansas meet will do a tempo workout on Friday — we do not want them racing this week because of the explanation mentioned above.

Tempo this Friday — 7 AM at Celebration:

For runners not running at the Chile Pepper meet in Arkansas — we will work out on Friday morning as a team. We want to make sure runners get in our normal tempo run in on Friday morning as a team before us coaches travel to Arkansas. We will practice at 7 AM at Celebration Park on Friday. We should finish by 8 AM. Athletes needing a ride to the high school field house to shower can ride the bus over to the HS.

LLI Golf Tournament:

LLI golf tournament is on October 7th at Heritage Ranch. They are looking for players, sponsors, and raffle items. If you can help with any of these, please check out the flyer at www.lovejoyfootball.com/paypal.html or email Chad Broussard at ccb17@phoenjx-tx.com.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

The Varsity Girls kicked it off in the 7:30 am Elite Varsity Girls race. The squad finished 15th in a 21-team race with a top-5 average time of 21:21.04, which compares to the average of 21:19.0 at last year's Fall Festival and 21:12 at the District Championships. This year's Girls Varsity is significantly less experienced than in prior seasons, so as they acclimate to running meets over the next month, they should improve over last year's best efforts on the Myers Park course.

Sophomore Carson Hockersmith (20:09.86, 31st in scoring) led and was close to her best time of 19:59.2 from last fall on the Myers Park course. Great stuff for only her second race this fall. Senior Shaelyn Ballard (21:15.12, 70th) separated herself from the pack today, and continues to show great improvement as she eggs the scoring pack forward. And that scoring pack came in a great wave today: sophomore Avery Silliman (21:40.10, 87th), freshman Lacey Pelkowski (21:49.13, 93rd), junior Emily Gueller (21:50.00, 94th), senior Noelle Franz (21:50.67, 96th), and freshman Sophia Estes (21:52.59, 98th). Close behind was freshman Andrea Richardson (21:57.86, 114th overall). This gave Lovejoy 8 runners under 22 minutes, with a 3-8 split time of only 17.86 seconds. Well done.

Amongst our District 15-5A opponents, only Highland Park's Varsity Girls performed better than Lovejoy today. The Scots remain the benchmark/target as our girls head into October with the District Championships 27 days away.
[results]

Lovejoy's top 10 boys competed in the Elite Varsity Boys race, a true black-and-blue event — extremely challenging competition. Plano West (a 6A powerhouse) eked out the victory over 2nd and 3rd place finishers Lovejoy and El Paso Americas (6A) by a slim 96-99-103 score. Very close race with great parity amongst the 196 runners competing. Lovejoy actually had a lower average time of 16:26.51 compared to the other two trophy recipients: 16:27.19 and 16:29.03. But it's all about the order of finish and who edges whom at the finish line. Plano West was a little edgier today.

And speaking of Lovejoy's top-5 average time of 16:26.51, that compares favorably with the 16:56 average at the Plano Invitational and the 16:24.6 average at the Gerald Richey. Yes, this race's average time actually went up by 1.91 seconds, but remember that the Myers Park course is brutal — the toughest our Leopards will compete on all season — while the courses at the Plano and Gerald Richey meets were flat and uneventful. Running coach/guru Jack Daniels has a rule of thumb that says every percent gradient of incline (going uphill) will slow you by 12-15 seconds per mile, and every percent gradient of decline (going downhill) will aid you by 8 seconds per mile. The net effect is a 4-7 second deficit per mile per degree of incline on a Myers Park course with few flat stretches and mucho incline. It's reasonable to say that the Boys Varsity effectively shaved off another 30 seconds on their top-5 average time again this meet. Wow! Remember that last November the boys' top 5 averaged 17:20 at State and 16:23.53 at Region.

This year's 5A State Championship races may be more exciting, energy infused, etc., but they probably won't be more competitive than today's Elite Varsity races.

The squad was again led by senior Grant Tiff (16:12.51, 12th place in scoring) who bettered his best Myers Park time from last fall of 16:28.00. This meet freshman Brady Laboret (16:17.23, 13th place) came the closest to running Grant down. A 5.34-second differential is probably the closest any Lovejoy runner has gotten to Grant in many races. Close behind came sophomore Brett Pedersen (16:21.31, 16th place). Today's finish showed less pack running, and more just-go-for-it in the last mile: junior Ryan Brands (16:40.90, 24th place) and junior Mr. Bradley Davis (16:43.41, 34th place) concluded Lovejoy's scoring. This marked Sunny D's first top-5 Varsity finish. The remaining 5 Lovejoy runners ... junior Ryan Spruell (16:37.40, 42nd overall), senior Nate Hartter (16:47.43, 43rd overall), freshman Will Muirhead (17:06.17, 63rd overall), junior William Godfrey (17:07.15, 66th overall), and junior Christian Sutter (18:05.10, 135th overall). So 9 of Lovejoy's runners were at 17:07 or better, and on the Myers Park course. Ouch!

Just for fun, if you take the average time of 17:10.64 for Lovejoy's second set of 5 runners and insert them as an independent squad amongst the other schools in this highly competitive field, our second 5 runners would have finished 10th in a 24-team race. They finished a few seconds behind Frisco Wakeland (17:05.00 top-5 average), and ahead of North Mesquite (17:11.61), Highland Park (17:14.95), Mesquite Poteet (17:17.76), Prosper (17:19.63), Dallas Jesuit (17:13.45), Frisco Liberty (17:25.08), and The Colony (17:31.63) to name a few of our well-known competitors. This is not to suggest that the Lovejoy coaches should rest our top 5 boys at the District Championships. But they could.
[results]

The depth of our boys roster was shown when the coaches assembled a Varsity Boys Red squad today and ran them in the Division 1 5A/6A Varsity Boys race. And by running 10 boys in the Elite Varsity Boys race, the Varsity Red was 3 runners depleted in strength. Yet the squad secured a very respectable 10th place out of 40 teams with an average time of 18:03.37 for the top 5 runners. Freshman Grant Guellar (17:41.10, 30th in scoring) and junior Trevor Joiner (17:47.60, 35th) were out in front with times under 18 minutes. Lovejoy's scoring was quickly closed out by sophomore Chayden Du Bois (18:09.74, 60th), freshman Zane Edwards (18:11.95, 64th), and sophomore Michael O'Brien (18:26.47, 82nd). Freshman Whitson Bedell (18:35.93, 101st) and sophomore Joe Vastano (18:44.11, 111th) put an exclamation point on things. Lovejoy's order of finish was 30-35-60-64-82-101-111 in a race with 308 finishers.
[results]

The JV Girls competed in the second largest race of the day with 468 finishers. The Lady Leopards placed 4th out of 37 teams — an accomplishment of which they can be very proud. Considering the coaches ran 10 girls in the Elite Varsity Girls race, Lovejoy's results in the JV Girls race is even more impressive. Freshman Heidi Fischer (22:59.99, 19th in scoring) broke the 23-minute barrier for the first time. Note that two weeks ago Heidi finished the fairly flat Gerald Richey course in 23:27.6 — so she delivered today's most noteworthy performance gain. Sophomore Summer George (23:27.57, 33rd) came next breaking the 22:30 mark. Then junior Autumn Purcell (23:49.42, 41st) led in the scoring pack of sophomore Emma Satterwhite (24:05.10, 45th) and senior Hallie Fischer (24:06.57, 47th). The girls order of finish was 19-33-41-45-47-68-84 with a 2-5 split time of 29.00 seconds. Solid stuff.
[results]

The extremely depleted JV Boys ran in the day's biggest race with 562 runners finishing and 46 teams scoring. With Lovejoy running 10 boys in the Elite Varsity Boys race and another 9 boys in the Division 1 Varsity Boys race, our JV Boys were 12 runners short of their full complement. Yet they managed an 8th place finish. Great work. Lovejoy's top 7 finishers were all freshmen: Thomas Michal (19:20.19, 31st in scoring), Erik Day (19:42.51, 47th), Sam Rouse (20:03.20, 66th), Mason Heruska (20:11.18, 74th), Kyle Easley (20:12.28, 78th), Brendan Dunleavy (20:28.82, 105th), and Shalin Mehta (20:30.48, 107th). Thomas and Erik were a bit out in front of the pack, but the 3-7 split time of 27.28 seconds was nice and tight. The order of finish was 31-47-66-74-78-105-107.
[results]

Click here for the LHS meet photo album. All LHS photos have been uploaded.

For our girls Varsity, I was very proud of Carson's race as she held back and paced our younger girls through the early stages before moving up claiming a top-10 spot in her first race back. Avery, Emily and Sofia all bettered their times from the Plano meet and we closed the gap on The Colony, without several of our top 5 who were out for testing.

Varsity Boys crushed it ... Grant almost caught Adamson's Armendariz, and our top 6 in the top 10 all under 16:40!!! Nathan also set a PR as did freshman Will Muirhead. I believe our 29 points scored is our lowest total in team history at a relatively early season meet ... Especially a Region preview meet.

The JV squads also ran very well including Grant Guellar who was narrowly defeated after a very smart race ...

I was very proud of everyone on the course yesterday ... Carly and Logan will send out more detailed analysis of their teams.

The weather this week looks to be very favorable so we're looking forward to another great week of workouts.

Run Happy Run Long

Greg

Now the question is can the team continue to improve at this pace. The coaches answer with an emphatic "yes" to continued improvement over the rest of the season. But as to how much improvement, well that's one of the things that will make the remainder of this season even more fun to watch. None of the Lovejoy Faithful will want to miss a single stride of the action from now until Lovejoy's last footfall on November 12th in Round Rock. The next meet is Lovejoy's XC Fall Festival where the level of completion will be riveting: Highland Park, Frisco Liberty, Wakeland, Lewisville Marcus, The Colony, Poteet, Plano West, Sanger, and Wylie East just to name a few of the 79 high school teams currently registered. The topography of the Myers Park course will challenge the runners more than any other course this season. This will be a great meet — be there or be square.

But back to today's Gerald Richey. The organizers confused the fans with the categories they used to describe the races. Our Varsity squads ran in the D2 races, which seemed like a step down for Lovejoy. But in actuality, the D2 races were designated for the 5A-6A schools.

The Varsity Girls turned in the day's most improved performance for Lovejoy, which is saying a lot considering how all the runners stepped it up today. The girls' performance was even more impressive considering how many of the senior and junior girls were back on campus in Lucas sitting for the ACT test. And one of the top freshman had a soccer conflict. By the numbers, today's Varsity Girls squad had 1 junior, 3 sophomores, and 6 freshmen, and only 4 of the girls ran Varsity at the Plano meet two weeks ago. So this could have been an off meet for the girls, but no. For the 8 girls who ran at both the Plano meet and the Gerald Richey, their times improved by an average of 53.0 seconds. This was the stat of the day.

The return of sophomore Carson Hockersmith also helped compensate for the absences. She led finishing 9th overall (20:37.7). This was a solid first race back for Carson providing another reason for the girls' 4th place finish. It sure was nice to see Carson back in action and running so well. Over the years Lovejoy runners have endured their share of injuries. As arduous as the team's standard training regimen can be, the grind becomes substantially more difficult for injured athletes trying to maintain conditioning while letting their bodies heal. The training is typically solitary and confined to the mundane of stationary bikes and swimming pools. Not fun. But Carson did it right during her recovery as shown by her performance today.

The pack was decently tight again this week with runners #2 through #4 separated by only 14.6 seconds. Getting in the rest of the scoring pack took a little more time, but that's because the lead runners simpler had a quicker pace today. Sophomore Avery Silliman finished #2 for Lovejoy in 21:20.7 followed by junior Emily Gueller (21:33.2) and freshman Sofia Estes (21:35.3). Freshman Andrea Richardson (22:20.2) closed out the scoring, with freshman Lacey Pelkowski (22:29.1) and sophomore Gracie Turner (22:31.4) playing spoiler by adding points to the other teams still trying to get their #5's across the finish line.

The final piece explaining the Varsity Girls' great performance today is coaching. Parents and fans know the coaching is there, but don't usually get to see it. Today however we got a glimpse of what goes on: Coach Littlefield had a lengthy pep talk with the squad at the starting line before the race — a talk much longer than ever previously witnessed at a Lovejoy cross country meet. The girls came out of the gathering with their game faces on and dialed in for action. Their performance speaks for itself.
[results]

The Varsity Boys basically embarrassed the competition by placing 6 runners in the top 10 overall and besting the second and third place teams from Coppell and Dallas Conrad by a score of 29-68-112. Considering that 15 teams competed in this race, a score of 29 looks awfully skinny. Coppell has a much improved program as it took 1st place in its other 3 races. But the Cowboys were no match for Lovejoy in the Varsity Boys 5A-6A race. This begs the question "who is?" We'll know more in a couple weeks at the Fall Festival.

Grant Tiff (15:58.3) was out in front battling for a 1st place overall finish with Adamson's Sergio Armendariz. Grant came up exactly 1 second short, a deficit that will disappear once the runners have completed their speed work near season's end in preparation for the championship races. But Grant did accomplish today's goal of a sub-16-minute time.

Junior Ryan Spruell (16:23.7) has separated himself from the rest of the scoring pack and is now in a gap between Grant and the scoring pack. Will Spruell catch Grant before the scoring packing catches back up with him? Tune in next time for another exciting episode of Lovejoy Cross Country!

Junior Ryan Brands (16:32.7) was in the house today leading this race's 4-way dogfight at the finish as he battled with sophomore Brett Pedersen (16:32.9), freshman Brady Laboret (16:35.5), and junior Mr. Bradley Davis (16:39.5). The top 5's average time of 16:24.6 shows a noticeable 31.5-second improvement over their 16:56.1 average posted at the Plano meet two weeks ago.

But the story doesn't end there since all 10 of the Varsity Boys finished at or under 17:30 for the race: senior Nate Hartter (17:14.9), freshman Will Muirhead (17:20.5), sophomore William Godfrey (17:23.5), and junior Christian Sutter (17:30.4). The order of finish was 2-3-7-8-9-10-22-25-30-33 in a race with 109 runners meaning today everyone was in the top one-third. About the only thing wrong with all this speedy pack running is that the photography staff is having trouble keeping up (i.e., the runners are easier to photograph when they slow down and spread out).
[results]

The JV Girls were really depleted today with 6 of their top runners moving up to fill Varsity spots. Still the girls finished 4th and their average time of 23:52.4 for the top 5 finishers was more than 24 seconds better than the Plano meet average of 24:26. Nice. Junior Autumn Purcell (23:15.4) led a closely grouped pack of sophomore Summer George (23:27.2), sophomore Emma Satterwhite (23:43.1), freshman Paula Delfin (24:23.8), sophomore Camille Hendrix (24:32.4), freshman Madeline Sanders (24:48.4), and freshman Haylie Peschke (24:57.7). The order of finish for the top 7 was 13-15-19-27-29-30-32 in a 152-runner race, so the top 7 all finished in the top 20% of the field. Very nice.
[results]

The JV Boys came in 2nd again today, but the Coppell Cowboys look a lot like Lovejoy with lots and lots of depth. Coppell is 6A, with an enrollment that's almost triple that of Lovejoy, which atypically puts the Leopards at a depth disadvantage. The improvement in the JV Boys' top-5 average time was about 5 seconds: a drop from 18:22 down to 18:17. Freshman Grant Guellar (17:50.7) led followed by sophomore Chayden Du Bois (18:01.6), junior Trevor Joiner (18:16.6), junior Preston Tiff (18:36.1), senior Josh Luck (18:42.4), sophomore Michael O'Brien (18:50.7), and freshman Whitson Bedell (18:59.3). Lovejoy's top-7 order of finish was 2-4-10-12-13-16-17. This was really just a two-team race between Lovejoy and Coppell: the scores for the other teams from 3rd place to 12th place ranged from 131 to 395 points.
[results]

Click here for the meet photo album. Marquee photos are being uploaded.

We had 17 runners compete in High School XC for the first time: Olivia Bullock 21:58, Sofia Estes 21:59, Reagan Matacle 22:08, Noelle Franz 22:23, Lily McCutcheon 23:00, Andie Richardson 24:00, Lacey Pelkowski 24:18, Zoe Bessa 25:17, Abi Carawan 28:08, Ally Carraway 27:49, Paula Delfin 26:43, Carissa Dresser 27:57, Alison Jobes 30:15, Lauren Motsney 27:42, Hannah Ortega 26:27, Haylie Peschke 26:49, Maddie Roth 28:27

Meet Results:

Plano XC meet: https://static.secure.website/wscfus/8989911/3869113/psd-xc-invitational-final.htm

Lovejoy Athletics Website Re-Cap: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/08/28/plano-isd-xc-recap/

This Week Reminders:

Spirit Wear Orders due Monday – TODAY!!

LISD Drug/Alcohol Policy form due Monday – TODAY!!!

Wednesday – TX.Milesplit.com will be at the workout to shoot their Workout Wednesday series. Only a few programs throughout the state get selected for this so don’t be late!

Coach C emailed out the workout schedule for this week earlier – if you do not receive his email let me know so we can get you added to the list.

Booster Club Meeting

The next booster meeting will be Tuesday September 6th at 7 PM in the LHS Lecture Hall.

9/12/16 Planning meeting for the Lovejoy XC Fall Festival — CANCELLED — this is the same night as open house as the high school. We will re-schedule and let you know the date.

If you have not joined the booster club please consider joining! We strive to have 100% participation. Click here for form.

Lovejoy XC Fall Festival — Help Needed!

We currently have 81 high school teams and 19 middle school teams signed up for our meet! We will need your help to make this meet a success. Click here to sign up to help with the meet – there are lots of volunteer positions available!
http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f094fa8af23a31-lovejoy

If you signed up already on Aug 11 — Parent XC meeting — sign up again on the link above please

If you would like to volunteer even if a spot fills up or volunteer another service please email me and Flora Brands — florabrands@gmail.com

Only 11 weeks until the State XC Meet!!!

Carly Littlefield

Today was a great day for racing — the atypical rains and cooler weather that started last month have promoted relatively lush cross country courses for the remainder of the summer and this fall. The Leopard's home course at Meyers Park is looking extremely healthy with nary a crack in sight. The Lovejoy and District meets will be the better for it.

The Varsity Girls squad looks excellent and blessedly healthy (Carson excepted). A lot of new faces should lead to dynamic improvements in their future meets. Today's race showcased great leadership and serious pack running, both prerequisites to success. The Highland Park All-Girl Army may be in for a surprise come District. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

The coaches ran 10 girls in the varsity race, while most teams ran only 7. This gave the coaches a great look at how the relatively young Lady Leopards can perform at the varsity level, and the girls didn't disappoint. Junior Emily Gueller (21:40.3, 48th overall) was a bit out in front of the pack setting a strong pace. The remaining 6 runners of the scoring pack were only separated by 25.0 seconds — extremely tight for such an early meet: Olivia Bullock (21:58.8), Sofia Estes (21:59.2), Shaelyn Ballard (22:03.3), Reagan Metacale (22:08.6), Avery Silliman (22:16.8), and Noelle Franz (22:23.8). Lovejoy's complete order of finish was 46-54-55-58-62-66-68-91-129-153 in a race featuring 192 runners. Only Emily and Shaelyn have prior LHS XC varsity meet experience, so these results are great news. For the record, the winning team from Frisco Liberty averaged 20:16.54 for its 7 runners.
[results]

Today was indeed a solid showing for the Varsity Boys, but it's early. It would be a mistake to think that the other contending 5A teams won't raise their game between now and State. If the pre-season rankings put a target on the backs of our Lovejoy boys, then today's results have further alerted the competition to the target's presence.

That said, the Leopards have room and plans for improvement. For starters, the meet was a first chance for several of Lovejoy's top boys to compete at the high school level, including some of the top JV runners who will definitely be vying for varsity spots by mid-season. And globe-trotting junior Ryan Brands will fully round back into 5K form. Hopefully the coaches can keep everyone improving and healthy for championship season that begins with the District meet.

The most encouraging aspect of today's Varsity Boys race was the finish: Lovejoy runners were taking it to one another in a serious intra-squad dogfight. Future meets should only increase the competitiveness as today's #5 and #6 runners join in the fray along with some of the hungrier JV runners. Senior Grant Tiff will have to raise his game in order to avoid getting cleated by the Lovejoy scoring pack that's closing in on him.

With a season that looks this bright, fans may want to go ahead and book their hotel rooms for the State Championships in Round Rock on November 12th. Since the 5A races go off at 9:40 am and 10:20 am, a Friday night stay in Round Rock is advisable. Baylor football plays away that weekend, but the UT Longhorns have a home game, and fans won't want to be fighting the Saturday morning traffic headed down to Austin.

Another lesson from today’s races is the importance of a healthy JV program. Pre-season prognosticators so often err in their rankings because they only look at returning starters and fail to consider up and comers from the JV ranks. Lovejoy's JV boys squad continues to be a force to be reckoned with. And it, along with a strong middle school program, are the biggest reason why Lovejoy can graduate mainstay runners in May, yet still have an excellent shot at making the podium at State the following November. We saw a great example of that today.

Grant Tiff (16:29.8) led finishing 2nd overall. If it were later in the season, Grant would have run down the race's winner who only finished 7.1 seconds ahead. But right now is about preparation. Then came the dogfight of Ryan Spruell (16:58.0), Brett Pedersen (16:58.3), and super-frosh-of-the-year candidate Brady Laboret (16:59.4) — this was the day's biggest highlight. Normally we don't worry about where the #5, #6, and #7 runners are at until we get to the Region championships. But the top 4 so tantalized the fans, that they couldn't help but scan the horizon and check their watches. The 14.8-second gap seemed crazy long. But then came Ryan Brands (17:15.0) and Mr. Bradley Davis (17:17.4) to close out the scoring and make a great early season statement about where the Varsity Boys are at. Senior Nate Hartter (18:23.3) is having his best season and led in a mini pack of Chayden Dubois (18:24.1) and Trevor Joiner (18:27.0). Christian Sutter (19:07.6) finished 102nd overall, putting all 10 of Lovejoy's runner in the top half of a very competitive 208-runner field. The order of finish was 2-6-7-9-16-17-62-64-65-100, and their average time of 17:11.7 for the top 7 compares favorably with the squad's average from last November's State Championship of 17:20.6. But the State course was hillier, muddier, rainier, and whatever …
[results]

The JV Girls squad has the biggest growth curve ahead of it on the team. So many new runners to integrate. But with their committed effort and Lovejoy coaching, all is possible. Today was about letting the younger and newer Lady Leopards stretch their legs and get a taste of what 5A high school XC is all about. The girls handled it all elegantly, despite all the perspiring. The JV Girls were relatively spread out, so improving the split time of 1:11.9 is a priority. And none of the JV Girls finished under 24 minutes. But it's early. The squad was led by Andrea Richardson, Gracie Turner, and Lacey Pelkowski.
[results]

Lovejoy's JV Boys never disappoint. They are my favorite part of any meet because with them it's all business, and they are ruthless in how they handle the competition. With Lovejoy running a 10-boy Varsity squad today, the JV had a little less horsepower and finished 2nd in a race against an un-depleted Plano West squad. But note that the Wolves only placed 8 runners in the top 50, while the Leopards can boast 11 runners in the top 50. There's that depth thing again. William Godfrey (17:53.4), Will Muirhead (17:55.5), and Grant Guellar (18:03.3) all had times that would put them in the Varsity top 7 today. Joe Vastono (18:58.1), Preston Tiff (19:01.8), Josh Luck (19:03.9), and Michael O’Brien (19:12.3) finished out the scoring. The order of finish for the scorers was 4-5-6-21-23-26-28. Of note, Wakeland finished in 3rd behind Lovejoy by 24 points.
[results]

Click here for the meet photo album. All photos have been uploaded.

Some things to note from the meet:

• Our Boys team beat 6A Allen and Plano West, defending 5A State Champions Frisco Wakeland, #6 5A ranked The Colony, and #10 5A ranked McKinney North.
• We had 18 runners compete in High School XC for the first time: Brady Laboret 16:59, Will Muirhead 17:55, Grant Guellar 18:05, Joe Vastano 18:58, Whit Bedell 19:40, Zane Emerson 19:45, Erick Day 19:49, Mason Heruska 20:19, Sam Rouse 20:22, Thomas Michal 20:22, Brenden Dunleavy 21:13, Travis Sipes 21:16, Sam Mena 21:22, Shalin Mehta 21:34, Kyle Easley 22:02, Matthew Michal 22:14, Matthew Sipes 22:29, and Michael Bell 28:28.
• We had 6 new personal best times compared to previous years for returning runners:
• Brett Pedersen – New PR of 16:58! – always big cracking the 17 min barrier
• Bradley Davis – New PR of 17:17 (last year 17:49)
• Chayden DuBois – New PR of 18:24 (last year 19:14)
• William Godfrey – New PR of 17:53
• Colin Jones – New PR of 19:36
• Chris Dunn – New PR of 22:19 (last year 24:15!)
• 7 top ten finishes (Varsity and JV combined)
• Grant Tiff – 2nd overall – Varsity
• Ryan Spruell – 6th overall – Varsity
• Brett Pedersen – 7th overall– Varsity
• Brady Laboret – 9th overall – Varsity
• William Godfrey – 4th overall – JV
• Will Muirhead – 5th overall – JV
• Grant Gueller – 6th overall – JV

Meet Results:

Plano XC meet: https://static.secure.website/wscfus/8989911/3869113/psd-xc-invitational-final.htm

Lovejoy Athletics Website Re-Cap: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/08/28/plano-isd-xc-recap/

This Week Reminders:

Spirit Wear Orders due Monday — TOMORROW!!!

LISD Drug/Alcohol Policy form due Monday — TOMORROW!!! — click here for form

Wednesday — TX.Milesplit.com will be at the workout to shoot their Workout Wednesday series. Only a few programs throughout the state get selected for this so don’t be late!

Coach C emailed out the workout schedule for this week earlier — if you do not receive his email let me know so we can get you added to the list.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

Girls Varsity:

This race was stacked with teams we'll need to beat to get to State, but also keep in mind we were racing w/o our #1 from last year Carson Hockersmith who when she gets on the course brings with her sub 20:00 experience. The most impressive to me was our :28 split from 1-5, and :43 from 1-7!!!! If we can maintain that type of split through the season we will be in the hunt. We will get faster, and now that a lot of the girls have weathered the shock of their first HS race, we will be a lot better next time out!!!

Boys Varsity:

We vanquished a few dragons from last year in defeating both Allen (23 pts) and Wakeland (84 pts). For all groups yesterday we told them to go out conservatively from the start and build, as we have yet to do any anaerobic work. They executed the race plan perfectly. Placing 4 in the top 10 at a meet loaded like that is very impressive. And what is especially cool to make note of is that only 2 of them were in the top 7 for the State squad last year. Proof of our team depth and how hard they have worked this summer.

Girls JV:

Again we saw a lot of freshman girls get their feet wet (literally — as there were a few flooded parts on the course) and ran well!! I'm excited to see them now begin to push for Varsity spots. That type of competition among team members is what drives workouts. As long as they don't go nuts. 8th place is good for us right now considering we raced 10 for varsity.

JV Boys:

Another really good race of being patient. You saw several guys from other teams do a Usain Bolt and then by the mile they were nowhere to be seen. The trio of Godfrey/Muirhead/Gueller led the charge for us up front. 2 of those 3 are freshmen!!! We are going to be good for many many years to come. The guys had a 2nd place finish to Plano West.

Milesplit Visit:

Running website TxMilesplit has scheduled a visit with us to video our workout on Wednesday. Throughout the season they visit a select few programs to check in on how they're training. It should be fun. I thought about having the team do a bunch of Navy Seal training exercises and windsprints with ankle weights ... But we'll stick to our training schedule.

Planning Ahead:

We will meet as a team at 7:00pm on Labor Day for the workout, which will be our last evening workout. We will then shift to 8th period. Transportation for 8th period workouts for those not driving will be provided in the form of school bus. Under no circumstances should a student driver provide a ride for someone other than a sibling.

Spirit wear orders are due tomorrow ...

I think that's about it for me. Look for emails from Carly and Logan for their insight.

Run Happy Run Long

Greg

• Varsity Girls: 9th place overall in a 26 team field with Carson out; great pack running clustered around senior Shaelyn Ballard; 1-5 split time of 28.3 seconds; squad was led in by junior Emily Gueller; Varsity Girls showing solid potential for championship season; order of finish was 46-54-55-58-62-66-68-91-129-153 [results]

• Varsity Boys: dominant 1st place finish outscoring 2nd, 3rd place by 40-63-99; placed four runners in top 10 with a 1-4 split time of 24.7 seconds — all 4 runners under 17 minutes; slight gap until #5 & #6 runners closed out scoring; senior Grant Tiff (2nd overall); junior Ryan Spruell (6th overall); sophomore Brett Pedersen (7th overall), freshman Brady Laboret (9th overall) — a real intra-squad dog fight at the finish; order of finish was 2-6-7-9-16-17-62-64-65-100 [results]

• JV Girls: reasonable 8th place finish out of 21 teams; Andrea Richardson, Gracie Turner, Lacey Pelkowski led the squad [results]

• JV Boys: okay, missed 1st place by only 14 points; Varsity Boys ran oversized squad of 10 runners, which made the difference in JV Boys race; 3 runners in the top 6: William Godfrey (4th overall), Will Muirhead (5th overall), Grant Guellar (6th overall); 1-5 split time of 1:08.4 hurt; 11 runners finished in top 50 of a 338-runner field; lots of new faces seeing their first competitive action, so times will drop a lot by October's end [results]

Click here for the meet photo album. All photos have been uploaded.

Lovejoy Boys CCCAT #1

If you have not heard, the boys team was recently pre-season ranked by the CCCAT #1 for 5A. Full article here: http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/08/13/cccat-pre-season-1/

No Weights This Week!

Coaches and teachers will be in meetings/prepping for the first week of school – so we will not have weights this week in the morning.

Did you miss the parent meeting?

[see other articles on this web page related to booster club memberships, Kroger Card program, team photos, and spirit wear]

Middle School Parent Meeting

If you have a son or daughter that plans to run cross country in Middle School we will have a parent meeting on Thursday 8/18/16 in the Willow Spring Cafeteria at 7 PM.

Thank you so much for all that you all do to support Lovejoy XC! Let's keep the kids healthy and strong ... The Championship Season will be here before we know it!

Carly Littlefield

Lovejoy Boys CCCAT #1

If you have not heard the boys team was recently pre-season ranked by the CCCAT #1 for 5A. Full article here:
http://lovejoyathletics.com/2016/08/13/cccat-pre-season-1/
It’s great to gain recognition from the CCCAT and Txrunning.com, but keep in mind they are just rankings and opinions. Nothing has been won yet and we have to keep our training up and stay healthy. There will be teams working just as hard to disprove that #1 ranking. Our focus is staying true to the training and running well for District, Regionals, and State.

No Weights This Week!

Coaches and teachers will be in meetings/prepping for the first week of school — so we will not have weights this week in the morning.

Did you miss the parent meeting?

[see other articles on this web page related to booster club memberships, Kroger Card program, team photos, and spirit wear]

Middle School Parent Meeting

If you have a son or daughter that plans to run cross country in Middle School we will have a parent meeting on Thursday 8/18/16 in the Willow Spring Cafeteria at 7 PM.

The State Meet is only 13 weeks away!

Let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Logan Kelly
903-821-8399 Cell

All-in-all a good way to knock off some summer rust and start thinking about serious racing again!!! The course itself was hilly through the middle sections, and some said measured long on their watches. Being a new course we don't have anything to compare it to, but I feel like we had a pretty good day ... And it was very cool to see sooo many parents in attendance for support.
http://www.wetimeraces.com/RacingSystems/Results/2016/MelonDash.htm#/results::1469970099118

Team Time Trial:

Next on our plate will be the 2 mile time trial on Saturday the 13th 7:00 am at Celebration. We DO have years of data for this event and I look forward to seeing some positive results.

Captain Elections:

Anyone wishing to serve as a team Captain for the 2016 run to the podium, needs to have an essay turned into me by Friday ... And I would like for the parents to sign it as well, to let me know you're aware of what we will be asking of your son/daughter. All athletes are welcome to submit an essay who feel like they would love to lead the team and fulfill the role as representative for the team. We will select 3 team members from each side. The voting will take place Monday the 8th at practice.

Training Phase III:

We enter our next training phase this week, and it's one which I feel separates our program from many others. I know a lot of teams will begin doing what we would classify as speedwork as soon as they start meeting this next week for season opening workouts. It's very tempting to do with a program as it will typically yield some good early season results. But once you start taxing that anaerobic system, there's no going back. We hold off on traditional speedwork and instead continue to develop that huge aerobic engine ... wanting to save our fastest racing for Oct 21, Oct 31, and Nov 12 !! Our work week will now look like this:

• Monday's continue to be progression Bangers
• Tuesday's and Thursday's are adjustment days
• Wednesday's now become the difference makers: a cycle of mile repeats/fartlek/cruise intervals/ and continuing hills
• Friday's are another big day on weeks we don't race for Threshold runs
• The weekend is still the most important run of the week for 20% of weekly total long run!!!!

This is our longest of the 5 phases taking us up to after the Chili Pepper October 3. This is the time of season a lot of gains can be made for athletes who put in the effort during the week ...

Parent Meeting:

We will have our back to the season meeting on August 11th at 7:00pm in the LHS Lecture Hall. You will hear the coaches outline the season discuss team policies and procedures, and have the opportunity to become involved with our booster club and home meet volunteers ... please try to attend ... this is shaping up to be a very memorable season, and you'll want to be as much a part of it as you can!!!

Have a great week and I hope you're able to enjoy these last few weeks of summer.

Run Happy Run Long

Greg