No one was spiked

Friday’s workout at the Spackenkill High School track went well. While several athletes did indeed “spike up” fortunately no one was actually “spiked.”

This is not a simple play on words; there was a lot of activity and a lot of runners going at a wide variety of paces on that track – not to mention the hulking metal obstruction in lane 1 that could not be moved (sorry, Schanz). Everyone respected everyone’s space and no one got hurt or run over.

Several team members have expressed dismay over the change of practice protocol for the spring semester, in that the men’s and women’s teams will be practicing at different times most days. It is true that the teams feed off each other’s energy on the track. However, practically speaking, it can get crowded out there and the more room our athletes have to work, the better.

Add in high school and modified athletes rightfully using their own track and it can turn into utter chaos. So splitting our large group up in the future makes sense. On this day, though, we were one big happy speedwork family.

Anyway … the women’s team did a good, controlled tempo workout while the men’s team did a good mix of speed and tempo in a continuous 8km workout. It was cloudy and chilly, but thankfully not windy.

One highlight was the Spackenkill team turning sophomore Billy Hild (a Spartan alum) into a cult hero by wildly cheering him on and clanging on cowbells (side note: I find the use of cowbells to motivate runners in road races to be a highly annoying practice).

In all, a good "spike up" day at the track ...