Good Things Must End

The 2011 cross country season came to an end yesterday...and a very good ending at that. Amanda ran the race she had to run to give herself a chance to be an All American for the first time. She ran the first half of the race just off of the wicked pace set by the front pack. Only three runners who went through 3K (halfway) slower than her were able to crack the top 40 (AA standard). In fact, Amanda ran seven seconds faster than a year ago on a much more challenging course. She also battled a leg injury over the last four weeks that I know affected her ability to train and race the way she needed to in order to be at her best for the NCAA meet. So 84th place was a terrific effort. It caps one of the best seasons by a Utah cross country runner in school history. She finished fourth in both of her regular season races (Stanford and Chile Pepper). Then she rallied from 18th place with a thousand meters to go at the Pac-12 championships to finish tenth and become the U's first ever all-Pac 12 athlete. Finally, she duplicated her ninth place finish at the NCAA regional meet from a year ago and landed one of the four individual qualifier spots at the NCAA meet. Very steady and very good at every big meet.

Overall, I feel good about the move forward our program made this year. We undoubtedly must continue to improve and do a better job of racing together. I know that will occur as the younger runners mature and are able to use this years worth of experience next Fall. We will return all but one of our top seven runners, however, that one just happens to be Alyssa who has been here for six years thanks to a few injuries along the way. Her personal growth has been instrumental in how much the program as a whole has been able to grow. Her perseverance, toughness, and always expect more attitude has helped put this program back on solid footing. I know our younger runners have all learned so much from her and her trials of success and dealing with setbacks. Hopefully, those lessons can continue to be passed on each year so that future teams can learn and grow as this one has. We will have high expectations next year, but for now it's time to set the focus on the upcoming track season. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Windy and Wet

We have arrived in Terre Haute for the NCAA Championships. Amanda, Alyssa, Hanah (our athletic trainer) and me are the travel party. We brought Alyssa last year as well. Her and Amanda have forged a great relationship and it gives her someone to hang out with and not think about the race too much. The meet is on Monday, but most teams arrive Friday evening or on Saturday. It gives us a couple of days to run the course as well as attend the student athlete banquet. The weather has included light showers and very breezy conditions thus far. The winds are expected to let up, but the rain chances will increase slightly going into Monday. There are already a couple of mucky spots on the course at the start, around the mile mark, and again midway through the race. We have the banquet tonight with the other teams/qualifiers. This year's guest speaker is Olympic Gold Medalist ('72 Marathon) Frank Shorter. Shorter along with Steve Prefontaine and others are credited for the running boom that occurred during the mid 70's in the US. I'll try to get some more photos and/or video for you tomorrow.

Stachies for Nachies

Click HERE to check out our entry in the FloTrack.org "Stachies for Nachies" contest. Be sure to vote for (facebook like) our entry.

Back to the Show

Today's press conference (along with a few pics) recapping the NCAA Mountain Region Championships. Enjoy!

Back To Back

It took a while to find out, but it was the news we were hoping for. After finishing ninth overall at the NCAA Mountain Region championships, junior Amanda Mergaert is headed back to the NCAA Championships for the second straight year. Last year she was the third individual from a non qualifying team before any at-large team births were handed out so we knew instantly that she was in. This year that same ninth place finisher meant Amanda was the sixth individual from a non automatic qualifying team and we had to hope that two teams from our region would earn at-large bids and that is exactly what happened. This made Amanda the fourth individual in our region and now it's off to Terre Haute, IN for Monday's NCAA Championship meet.

Overall, our team finished eighth was slightly lower than we hoped. However, six of our top seven will return next year. Only senior Alyssa Abbott who finished 14th (and just missed making the NCAA meet for the second time) will graduate. I also thought sophomore Rebekah Winterton and junior Hilary Troutner gave us great individual efforts at the regional meet. Winterton was running with a broken toe.

Mergaert is slated to compete in the six-kilometer championship race at Gibson Championship Course in Terre Haute, Ind., beginning at 12:58 p.m. ET next Monday. A live webcast of the championships will be broadcast from noon to 1:30 p.m. ET on NCAA.com.

Pac 12 Pics

Pac 12 Chat

Post meet press conference. I discuss our performance at the inaugural Pac-12 Championship meet.

Pac-12 Review

On a very warm day just west of Phoenix we competed in the first ever Pac-12 championships. It was the first championship event for any sport at the University of Utah. It was a great atmosphere and I thought our team responded well to the new challenge. We finished where we were ranked going in (8th). However, we ended up only 18 points behind #16 ranked Cal and well in front of the last four teams. Amanda Mergaert became the first ever all-Pac 12 athlete in any sport for the U of Utah. She was followed by senior Alyssa Abbott who was 24th overall. True freshman Susannah Hurst was 44th. Sophomore Rebekah Winterton (58th) and junior Hilary Troutner (80th) rounded out the scoring five. All but Mergaert set new PR's. However, Mergaert passed eight runners in the last K to garner all conference honors. She had opened near the lead for the first half of the race. After falling back in from the lead following a huge surge she was able to regather herself for the strong finish.

Overall, I was pleased with how well we fought for the entire 6K distance in what was easily the best competition of the year for us. Our younger runners went out as fast as they have all year and still found themselves at the end of pack over the first mile. However, they slowly chipped away at those runners who went out too fast and were able to get us back in the race as a team. It was also satisfying to see a senior who came back specifically to continue to help this program grow and transition into the Pac-12 be able to have a successful race. Alyssa has competed at this level since her first day on campus so it was especially gratifying to see her compete as a Pac-12 athlete and set a new PR as well.

If you missed my pre-race interview with Flotrack you can click HERE to view it.

The pictures attached are compliments of Bruce Fain who is the father of sophomore AuraLea Fain who was our eighth runner.

Chillin' on a Dirt Road

Another week in SLC and another great concert. Jason Aldean played in front of a sold out crowd which included myself. My seats weren't quite as good as my Foo Fights tickets last week, but they were solid.

Press Row

Coach Kepler's Press Conference following the Chile Pepper Invite (Oct 15th).

How Do You Like Your Chile?

Top Photo: Amanda and Alyssa get out in stride with the leaders at Chile Pepper
Bottom Photo: Chile Pepper is truly a festival and provides a great atmosphere for the runners and spectators alike.

After a weekend off we hit the road to compete in our final regular season meet at the University of Arkansas. The Chile Pepper Invitational featured 35 teams from all over the country. We were able to take 7th which was a solid performance. Amanda finished 4th again in a new PR of 20:19 for 6K. Alyssa ran 20:59 for 17th. Rebekah (21:48) and Susannah (22:06) were 47th and 63rd. Nikki Rietz rounded out our top five in 105th (22:41). There were 296 runners in the field so our top five being in the first third was good. We still have some work to get done before we compete in the first ever Pac-12 championship meet. Six of the 12 teams are currently ranked in the top 20 in the country. So we have a big task ahead of us, but our group is confident that they will race and compete well in the best conference in the country. We know that this meet will help us prepare for the NCAA Regional meet two weeks later. Championship time is here. It's time to sharpen up and race at our highest level of the year over the next five weeks!

Rockin' in SLC

Here is another example of a great concert in SLC. Last night I saw the Foo Fighters. I could almost guarantee you've heard their songs ("My Hero", "Everlong", "Times Like These", "The Best of Me", etc.) They have been together for over 16 years. Lead singer Dave Grohl was the drummer for the 80's grunge band "Nirvana". Here are some pics and video from the concert...yes I had very good seats:)

Track GameDay

Track and Field practice has been underway for a few weeks now so I thought I would give you a taste of what they have been up to. Under the direction of throws coach, Tapio Kuusela, the throwers have looked very good early this Fall. Today was primarily a hammer and shot practice day. Meanwhile, associate head coach, Burke Bockman, has the sprinters, hurdlers, and jumps going through Fall condition. Fridays are typically a game day. It breaks up the minotiny of training and provides an outlet of competition nearly every week. Several of our young women played other sports during the fall and winter seasons in high school. They are used to competing and Friday GameDay provides an opportunity to sharpen the competitive edge that they would not otherwise get. Enjoy.

Living Right in Vegas

A smooth trip and a terrific team race at the UNLV Desert Invite was our reward for a very good week of practice. We ran without three of our top four runners in an effort to give some of our younger runners a chance to step up in a leadership role. Several of them responded well which will help us as we prepare to enter the championship part of our schedule in October. We won the meet by placing eight runners in the top 20 (2-5-8-11-12-14-17-20). Our 1-5 spread was exactly a minute which we would like to improve with that group.

Hurst, Troutner, Nielson, Rietz, Stringfellow, Mills, Fain, and Yates were the eight. That is FR, JR, FR, FR, FR, FR, SO, and JR.

We will be competing next at the Chile Pepper Festival hosted by the University of Arkansas on Oct 15th. We anticipate being back at full strength the rest of the way. Check back for some pics and video from practice this week.

Stanford Pics/Practice Video

Some nice pics from the Stanford meet of Amanda and Alyssa together. Susannah and Rebekah also had good races. The video is from Tuesdays interval session at Sugarhouse Park. Enjoy.

Fourth and Fourth on the 24th

Four seemed to be the number of the day at our first big invitational meet of the season. The Stanford Invite was an opportunity to finally run our top runners together for the first time all season. We finished 4th in the 29 team field with 156 points. Junior Amanda Mergaert finished fourth overall in 20:27. Senior Alyssa Abbott was 13th in 21:04. Both were PR's on that course as well as their highest individual finishes.

True freshman Susannah Hurst and sophomore Rebekah Winterton were 35th and 37th, respectively. Winterton ran almost a minute faster than she did as a freshman.

Another true frosh, Nikki Rietz, was 89th in 22:33 to round out our top five. She passed 13 runners in the last 600 meters which is a very positive sign. Overall, I thought we competed well. We will be working on closing the gaps and running together in the next few weeks.

We are off to Las Vegas for the Desert Classic Invite on Saturday. Again, we will rest a few of our top runners in preparation for the Chile Pepper Invite in three weeks.

Interval Heaven

A little footage from our practice at Sunnyside Park yesterday....3 minute Intervals. Enjoy.

Provo, Utah - The University of Utah women's cross country "B" team wrapped up competition at the BYU Invitational with 72 points to finish third-place overall.

We had a horrible start and found ourselves at the back of the pack. This course is always "sneaky" difficult, but we were too conservative. However, I liked the way several of our women were able to work their way back into the race.

With six of the our top runners resting for the week, freshman Nikki Rietz led the way for the team with her 11th-place finish. Rietz had a slow start and was around the 40th position at the beginning of the race. As the race continued, Rietz fought her way back toward the front and finished with a time of 18:53.

Finishing second for the Utes and 22nd overall was freshman Macee Nielson with a time of 19:22.2.

It's time for everyone to step up physically and mentally as the heart of our schedule is upon us starting with the Stanford Invite this weekend.

MS Champion

Last night was another very special night for an individual as well as our program. Senior Alyssa Abbott was honored by the Utah-Southern Idaho Chapter of the Multiple Sclerosis Society as the Female Collegiate Athlete of the Year. The 33rd Annual "Dinner of Champions" presented by the McCarthey Family honored people who have excelled in a variety of ways to support the fight against MS. Some of these people have a direct connection with MS among family or friends. Other recipients serve as volunteers and leaders in the community to raise awareness of MS. To have an athlete from our program selected to receive this award is very special. Alyssa has been a leader for us in so many ways on and off the track. Her goals are always set very high and her focus to achieve those goals is never compromised. We are all extremely proud of her.

The University of Utah was also represented by Nate Fakahafua (Male HS Athlete of the Year) who is a freshman on the Utah Football team and Dr. Chris Hill (Sportsperson of the Year) who is our Athletic Director (and my boss:)

All of the recipients join a very select group of past recipients who excelled in much more than their athletic endeavors. While their successes in athletics have served as an inspiration to many, it is their work in the classroom and community that have allowed them to be deserving of their respective honors.

Last nights dinner and ceremony was a collection of some of the very best athletes, community leaders, and people to ever live in Utah. It was a fun and memorable evening. A special thanks goes to the McCarthey Family for putting on this event and leading the fight in finding a cure for MS.

1-2-3-4 Dominate!

My apologies for the delay of this posting. I was out of town yesterday at the annual Pac-12 coaches meetings. However, it was a very good weekend for the Utes as we dominated the UNR Twilight 4K in Reno on Saturday night. Senior Alyssa Abbott returned home and put on a show for her family and friends as she ran away from the field in her first race in almost three years. Abbott easily won the race in a time of 14:41. Her first race as a freshmen was also in Reno and she won that race as well. Sophomore Rebekah Winterton (15:02), freshman Susannah Hurst (15:07), and junior Hilary Troutner (15:10) took the next three spots overall. Another freshman, Lauren Mills was 10th (15:33) to close out the Utah scoring and give the Utes an easy 20-41-65 victory over host UNR and UNLV. Lucy Yates (13th), Kate Stringfellow (15th), Nikki Dotter (17th), Alexis Davis (24th) and Brooke Casagranda (28th) rounded out the Utah finishers.

We held out a few runners for a variety of reasons again so we should continue to improve when they return to the line up. It was fun to have everyone compete well and win a meet in that fashion. Both UNR and UNLV are young so I thought we did what we should have. We have some work to do in the next two weeks before we run our first 6K race of the season at Stanford.

Anticipated Debut

After back to back medical redshirt seasons super senior Alyssa Abbott will step back on the cross country course for the first time since the 2008 NCAA Championships. Arthroscopic knee surgery on both knees forced her to miss the 2009 and 2010 seasons. Her track seasons in that time have included qualifying for the NCAA Regional Championships in the 1500 and 5K both years. So she has continued to improve when she has regained her health after extensive re-hab and cross training both times.

On Saturday Alyssa will go back to her hometown (Reno, NV) where she ran and won her first ever collegiate race in 2006. It will be a different course, but family and friends will be there to watch the senior open what we all believe can be a very special season.

She's been our leader during her entire time in our program. It's great to see her get to lead us into our inaugural season in the Pac-12. While the conference affiliation, the course, and the uniforms are different one thing hasn't changed with Alyssa. She will be excited and nervous prior to the race, but once the race begins everyone will see what I've been lucky enough to see for the last five years....the bouncing blonde pony tail clad in a white top and red bottoms leaving a trail for everyone else to follow:)

Hills at Red Butte

Tuesday's practice focus was getting in some hill running. We have lots of options when it comes to hills near campus. Fortunately, many of them are on dirt and gravel. They vary in slope and length so we can simulate just about any type of hill that a course will give us. The first part of the workout was on a long, steady hill. The second half was on a dirt trail in the foothills behind the medical center and is much steeper.

Watch out! I'm starting to become a movie "director". I didn't really have to do too much editing. Adding the music didn't even require a medical degree. Hopefully, this isn't just beginners luck.

Enjoy!

...and We're Off!!!

Four true freshmen and a newcomer to the scoring five helped us finish third in our opening meet of the season at Utah State. Susannah Hurst-FR, Hilary Troutner-JR, and Nikki Rietz-FR (see second video) finished 2-5-8 to lead our team into the 2011 season. True freshmen Macee Nielson and Lauren Mills were 23rd and 25th to round out our scoring.

I was impressed with our freshmen, especially with it being their first collegiate meet. I thought they ran aggressively. Hilary put in a ton of miles and rededicated herself to finding out how good she can be. I'd say she's off to a great start. We had some other solid performances for the first meet as well. We held out three of our top four and four of our projected top ten runners so we should improve even more as we add them into the mix at upcoming meets.

Getting Libertized

We spend a lot of time at Liberty Park doing our threshold work during the year. It is only about two and a half miles from campus so it's easy to get to. Liberty features a 1.5 mile loop with either a woodchip trail or grass to run on. The trail has a gradual slope to it, but not enough in either direction to interrupt the consistency we are looking for in these efforts.

Another attempt at using my HD Flip Cam. I even did a little editing by trimming some of the clips. If I ever figure out how to combine them and add music I'll be in business and you won't have to listen to me giving instructions.

Hopefully, I'll be able to get some footage from our meet on Saturday. Be sure to play the videos from the bottom to the top. I didn't save them in the in the right order (still learning).

Working with a new Flip Cam (It's HD!!!). Of course, that means more things to figure out. Took a few videos at camp and this is the one that turned out good enough to post. Lucy, Nikki, Nikki, and Lauren running some hills on an old dirt road.

Fan Fest!

Our annual Fan Fest celebration took place earlier today at the football stadium. Each team has an area for fans of all ages to stop by and obtain autographs, meet the student athletes, and play some games. We were in charge of a huge inflatable obstacle course. As usual our team was terrific interacting with the kids and adults. With this being our inaugural season in the Pac-12 there was a lot of excitement about that.

If your local you may have also heard senior Alyssa Abbott and myself on ESPN 700 radio just before 1PM being interviewed about the upcoming season as well. Overall, it was a fun day...but now the season can begin. We will be at Utah State next Saturday morning for our usual season opening meet. More details about whose running later in the week so check back.

Camp '11

Your 2011 University of Utah Women's Cross Country Team

Why Does it Have to End?

What a terrific camp! I am really pleased with how everything went. The workouts, the team activities, and team bonding were all very successful. This mornings run at Deer Creek Trail above the reservoir was amazing. Cool temps mixed with the rising sun and a few high clouds made for a very enjoyable run.

The run was followed by blueberry pancakes, packing, and some quick showers before heading back to camp. Tomorrow we will finish the week with a long run up on Pipeline Trail near campus. I hope you've enjoyed following our camp journey this week. School and the regular season begin on Monday. I'll keep you updated.

Todays pics are pretty cool. See if you can find Amanda and Alyssa in the picture that looks like the side of a mountain:)

Keep'em Fed So They Train Well

Tonight I was able to redeem myself as a grill master...whew!!! I received some help from our resident English woman (Lucy) and Nikki. Overall it was another terrific day of camp. Two good running sessions, great meals, excellent team projects, and a well deserved stop at the local ice cream shop (Fill'er Up). Camp comes to an end after our run in the morning and blueberry pancakes. Be sure to catch pics of our run tomorrow. We will run at Deer Creek Trail which has some amazing views.

The AM Workout

Another productive day of camp is well underway. A short, but fairly intense hill workout this morning followed by breakfast and a team meeting. The rest of today includes working on team goals, and afternoon run on the Rail Trail near Echo with lunch, dinner, and an evening activity mixed in.

Camp has progressed well thus far (with the exception of my grilling skills last night which included charring a few of Tyson's best). Check back for more amazing pics from our run later today.

It's All About Tempo

After a great dinner, team introductions, and an evening run the first day of camp ended with many tired individuals. However, we were up early for an AM threshold interval workout that went well. We had a few different groups and they all ran well together. Sometimes something that simple...just running together can be a challenge for a new group. However, the freshmen all found there spots and fit right in. Breakfast, team meetings, team activity, lunch, short nap, and an afternoon easy run before dinner are on the schedule yet today. Check back for more pics. I hoped to have video, but I'm struggling with downloading my flip cam at the moment.

Don't worry parents...they are eating well and getting plenty to drink :)

Report Day

The 2011 University of Utah Cross Country season officially kicks off at 4:30p today. Student athletes will arrive and get physicals. Tomorrow we begin at 9am with meetings, followed by a short team run, and then we are off to camp. Check back here this week for pictures and video of camp. We have a terrific returning group and six new freshmen who will lead us into our inaugural season in the Pac-12. It will be exciting and a great challenge to be part of the best xc conference in the country. We all look forward to raising the bar and continuing to keep this program on the steady rise towards being a national power.

More Academic Success

After having three individual athletes receive all academic honors from the US Track & Field/Cross Country Coaches Association last week, the same association has honored the University of Utah Track & Field TEAM as one of 164 all academic teams from the past season. The Utes combined for a 3.29 GPA during the spring semester.

That is the highest overall team GPA we've had in my six years as the head coach here at Utah. We've continually made progress each year. To have over 40 young women combine for that type of GPA is impressive. However, our goal is to have that become the standard rather than an exceptional year.

Our athletic academic support services do a terrific job to help our athletes receive the support and resources they need to be successful in that regard.

We had 16 athletes receive Dean's List honors (3.5+) and 30 achieve a GPA of 3.0 or higher. It took 3.84 to be on our top ten list for the spring semester. As a coach it's hard to ask for much more.

Nice job gals!

The A's Have It

Senior Alyssa Abbott along with sophomores Angie Kaplar and Amanda Mergaert were named to the 2010-11 US Track & Field/Cross Country Coaches Association All Academic Team. To be eligible student athletes were required to obtain a 3.25 cumulative GPA. They also had to finish the indoor or outdoor season ranked in the top 96 of an individual event, be part of a relay that was ranked in the top 48 on the national list at the end of the season, or compete in any round of the NCAA Championships.

Abbott (3.89 GPA) qualified for the NCAA Championships in two events (1500 and 5K) for the third straight year. Kaplar (3.25) was a first time NCAA qualifier in the 100 meter hurdles. Mergaert (3.31) was also a two event qualifier (800 and 1500) in consecutive seasons.

Pics from top to bottom: Kaplar, Mergaert, Abbott

2011 XC Schedule Posted

Our cross country season schedule has been finalized and is now posted to the right of this post. We go to some great meets and cities. The meet in Reno, NV on September 10th will be under the lights as it is a twilight meet. Stanford is always a huge meet and our gals love that course. The trip to Las Vegas will be our first ever for cross country. The Chile Pepper meet at Arkansas is another huge meet where we have performed well in the past. Our initial Pac-12 conference meet will be in Phoenix which should be a lot of fun. The Mountain Region meet is only 45 minutes from our campus so we expect to have a good following helping us try to qualify for the NCAA Championships. Wish us luck!

Rebekah (Part 2)

This is the second part of Rebekah's trip to the US Junior meet where she met some new friends. How many of them to you recognize?

Rebekah and Friends (Part 1)

As promised here are the pics of Rebekah and her new friends that she met at the US Championships this past weekend.

Molly Huddle: 5K Champ and American Record Holder
Lisa Koll: 4x NCAA Champion
Kara Goucher (and son Colt): 10K Runner up
Shalane Flanagan: 10K Champ and American Record Holder
Jen Rhines: 3rd in the 10K

These are the girls. The boy pics will be posted soon so check back.