Milesplit.US Cross Country Journals
Katie Kinkead returns this season as one of the top distance runners in Pennsylvania, as well as the U.S. Last year Katie earned three runner-up medals in the three seasons - taking that spot each time to the same athlete. She was 6th in the Penn Relays High School girls Championship of America - in one of the deepest fields ever. Follow Katie for the next few months as she journals about her final season.
Entry #1 9/27 | Entry #2 10/4 | Entry #3 10/25 | Entry #4 11/1 | Entry #5 11/10 |
Katie Kinkead
(Sr., Central Bucks East HS, PA)
Journal Entry #5 (November 10, 2010)
Entering this cross country season I had some goals, but I would have to say my biggest one was to become a State Champion. This past Saturday the opportunity had come, I was on the starting line at Hershey waiting for the gun to go off so I could race the best competition in the state. I wanted to run the same way I ran this race last year, conservative in the first mile and slowly move up. At the same time, last year I was looking to be in the top 3-5 so I was just focusing on picking off girls the whole race. This year I didn't want to lose contact with whoever was leading. By the mile, I was running in the top group. For whatever reason I didn't feel like myself, and I slowly started to see the girls pulling away. It was very tough to try to keep up with them and have my body not be able to respond. A bit after the two mile my teammate, Jenny Guidera, started running next to me and I was just hoping that I could run with her and we could work together until the finish, but I just could not do it. The last half mile all I could think about is how I had lost my dream and that I needed to hang in there so I would be able to get a medal. Finishing 18th and 34 seconds slower than last year was a huge disappointment for me.
I felt like I let my teammates, coaches, friends and family down. I soon realized, however, that nobody was upset at me, but upset for me. Not only did my friends and family help cheer me up after the race, but I had a lot of runners, parents, and even some people that I was able to meet for the first time come up to me and say some kind words. I'm so grateful that I have such a supportive group of people that are by my side both when I'm running my best and when I'm struggling. This is one race, and it doesn't define my high school career. This is in the past, all I can do now is try my hardest in the future.
Last year I skipped doing anything post-season, but this year I had my heart set on competing at Foot Locker. It is important for me to figure out what went wrong at the state meet, so that I can recover and improve rather than go the other direction. I hope to get in some rest along with some quality workouts to prepare me for a great experience!
Finally, I have made a verbal commitment to Syracuse University! I believe the school is a perfect fit for me, and I'm extremely excited about the future! I took an unofficial visit last January and I realized that a great opportunity had presented itself. When I took my official visit this fall, I was able to see a lot more of the campus. I got to meet the team, Coach Fox and Coach Bell. After taking official visits to Georgetown, Penn State, Syracuse and Villanova, I had a tough decision because I felt like I had four schools that I really liked and could see myself as a student athlete at any of them. In the end, I had a feeling that Syracuse is where I belong, so I am thrilled to say that orange is my new favorite color!
Journal Entry #4 (November 1, 2010)
Happy Halloween! Hopefully everyone enjoyed their weekend and is getting fired up for States this Saturday! Congrats to all of the teams and individuals that have qualified out of their district and are getting ready for a fun meet at Hershey!
This past week our team was all about getting ready for our District meet and feeling good.
Monday - Took off
Tuesday - 3x1600 @ threshold pace with a minute recovery
Wednesday - I had an easy distance run
Thursday - This was an interesting day because I figured we would be doing a pre-meet run anywhere from 10-30 minutes. Instead, Coach Catinella pointed to each individual and said "What do you need to do today to get ready for tomorrow?" I think it was funny, some people didn't want to run at all, but everyone ended up running at least 10 minutes. Before our run Coach Cat gave us a speech about having no regrets and that the group of girls on the team will never be the same again, so together we had to work hard so that we would all be at states next week.
Friday - The team was super excited but nervous. I had a good feeling about the day though. We've worked hard this season, and there is no reason for anyone to have such a bad race that would hold us back from going to states. But even with our confidence up, we had to remember that other teams were chasing after the same thing we wanted.
We had to work hard to achieve our goal. About 400 girls toed the line, and the gun went off without much warning. It caught me off guard, and everyone was sprinting out. I got boxed in with about 50 girls ahead of me. It was such a terrible start, I was frustrated because I needed to work a lot harder that next 400m to get with the leaders. Once I got up there, I ran with about five girls who kept switching positions the entire race. Tori Gerlach came away with a strong individual win, and Pennsbury ran great to capture a super impressive team title! Our team got the fifth and final qualifying spot and we are off to States! Our team was so excited to make it, I think we were all tearing up a little!
After we qualified for the first time in school history, I sent texts around, asking my teammates what they were thinking.
"If there was a year to make it to states together, this was our chance!" said sophomore Veronica Eder, who finished in 40th place.
"I'm so happy that we made it. The whole race I just kept reminding myself that I can't have any regrets. Who knows, this could be my last race of the season, but if I can push out of my comfort zone, I will look back and know that I did my best to help the team!" said Sarah Latch, after running a 20:23 in her first XC District race as a sophomore.
Junior Kara Shen, our number five runner, said, "We've been motivated to do this since last year. I'm so glad that we were able to pull it off today!"
Jenny Guidera and I were excited too, last year we went together as individuals, but we wanted our team to go with us during our senior year. "It still hasn't hit me yet that we are all going. It is neat to see how close we have all become this season," she told me.
Cross country is a great individual sport, but it's much more fun when you have teammates to share it with.
Katie took a break 10/11 & 18 because of her workload at school and college visits.
Journal Entry #3 (October 25, 2010)
Hey guys!
It has been a couple weeks since I wrote my last journal. I've been busy with college visits, training and school. I've taken four official college visits to Georgetown, Penn State, Syracuse and Villanova. I enjoyed my time spent at each school; getting to know the team and coaches, viewing the campus and getting a feel of what next year will be like.
My training has been going well, I've seen an improvement each week. A regular mid-season week looks like this:
Sunday - Long Run
Monday - Off
Tuesday - Easy Run
Wednesday - Duel Meet or Threshold Workout
Thursday - Easy Run
Friday - Easy Run
Saturday - Intervals or Threshold Workout
This week our team was getting ready for the League Championships; we went into the meet with a record of 6-1, as did CB West and North Penn. We knew it would be a close race, but we wanted to win. As it turned out we beat CB West by one point and North Penn by two. Our team is excited about our win, but we also realize that it was so close that districts are going to be a challenge. We are going to have to run faster, so that we can reach our goal of being in the top 5 in the districts and qualifying for states!
Individually I ran 17:55 and my teammate, Jenny Guidera, ran 17:59. I was thrilled to go 1-2 in our league meet. I think we surprised a lot of people. Both of us are looking forward to districts, states and foot locker regionals. This is how my week broke down:
Sunday - 12 mile long run
Monday - Off
Tuesday - 4x1600 @ Threshold pace: 6:00, 6:05, 5:59, 5:56. 4x200 @ mile race pace: 37s
Wednesday - 8 mile easy run
Thursday - 4 mile easy run
Friday - League Championships
Saturday - 8 mile easy run
Good luck to everyone in their district meet!
Journal Entry #2 (October 4, 2010)
Hey guys!
This week my training has felt the best it has all year. I think partially it is because the weather has been under 70 degrees and so I haven't felt sluggish from any heat.
On Monday I had the choice of an easy pool run or a day off. I went in the pool because my legs always feel awesome afterwards. I think it sort of flushes out any toxins from my legs and gets me ready for the week. Tuesday, it was a little sticky out but I felt good, so I did my run on some hills and tried to keep a 7:15-7:30 minute pace.
Wednesday, we had our 2nd double-duel meet of the season. This time it was against North Penn and Pennridge. They are both good teams and the top runners from both schools having been running great this season! (Tori Gerlach from Pennridge and Meghan McGovern from North Penn). I get to race these girls a lot, and over the years we have become good friends. It definitely helps with any nerves on race day! My goal time was 18:50 or faster because I ran 19:08 last year so I wanted to see a drop in my time. The first mile went out in 6:07. At that point I was worried that our time was going to be really slow, but as the race went on, we picked up the pace. Tori Gerlach ended up winning in 18:06. I finished at 18:10. It was bittersweet; I wanted to win, but I was happy with my time, and I can tell that I am moving in the right direction. Our team was upset that we didn't beat North Penn, especially because the difference was just a point, but I think we are all fired up to race them again at Leagues, Districts and hopefully, States!
Thursday and Friday were easy days. I ran 8-9 miles on both days to give my body time to recover and prepare myself for a good workout the next day. I did my run on Friday at Lehigh University which was hosting the Paul Short meet. It was a very fun day! I went to support and cheer for my friend, who ran in the open race, I was also able to see the college race which was amazing because that's something I plan on being a 
part of next year! After 8 races and my run, I was tired but I was still hanging around to watch the brown high school races! For the boys brown race there was a big pack at the mile, right before the 2 mile it narrowed down to maybe 10 people. With about 150m left it was a four man race and Reece Ayers came out on top with a powerful kick to take the win! Up next was the girls brown race which had some hype about Sara Sargent and Angel Piccirillo going head-to-head. Both definitely lived up to the excitement, they went out fast and were together right around the two-mile and entering the cornfields. When they came out towards the finish Sara had opened up to finish in a quick 17:43. Not far behind Angel ran a new PR of 18:04. Great job to everyone there!
On Saturday, our team took a bus to a long, flat, dirt path for a tempo run. I warmed up and then did a 4 mile tempo run. Our team does this to increase our body's lactate threshold. That's the point at which lactic acid begins to accumulate in a runner's muscles. The workout helps in races because it delays the time that fatigue and soreness starts, so then we are able to sustain a faster pace for a longer time. After the tempo I did 4x6 sec. pick-ups at an estimated mile race pace. Then I cooled down. On Sunday I did my weekly long run.
I don't have an invitational this weekend, but I'm looking for a solid week of training. I have my third college visit this weekend and I'm really excited! Good luck to everyone racing this week and thanks for reading!
Katie
Journal Entry #1 (September 27, 2010)
Introduction
Hey everyone,
My name is Katie Kinkead, I’m a senior at Central Bucks East in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. I was asked to write a mini-journal about my experiences, training, and thoughts during the cross-country season. I’d like to thank the guys at Milesplit, for giving me this opportunity.
I got into running as a freshman when I thought it would help me grow as a soccer player. As the year progressed I became to enjoy XC/Track. I was a pretty good soccer player and I was an okay runner but I didn’t want to just be okay or good at something, I wanted to choose one and become the best that I could be. I saw more potential in running. So I completely stopped playing soccer and really started to dedicate myself to running. Now, a couple years later, I am in my final HS cross country season and am getting ready to attack the goals that I have set this summer to become a better athlete! For this season, my individual goals are to win states and qualify to Footlocker nationals. As a team, I want to help CB East qualify to states for the first time in school history. From there we hope to be top three in the state.
Summer is over and school has started, but since XC began a couple months ago (June 12th for me) I will talk a bit about my training. I took off two weeks after my last race at the PIAA State Championships. Following my break I started to run 15 miles a week at maybe 7:30-8:00 minute pace. By July I was up to 30 miles. The first week of August, I went to Green Mountain Running Camp in Vermont with my team. These are my workouts from that week:
Sun. Aug 1 - 25 min run easy about 7:30-8:00 pace (arrival day)
Mon. Aug 2 - AM pool run for 30 mins, PM 4 miles easy + core
Tues. Aug 3 – AM pool run for 30 mins, PM 4.5 miles + 6 strides
Wed. Aug 4 – 5 miles + 6 strides
Thurs. Aug 5 – AM 40 min pool run, PM 4 miles
Fri. Aug 6 – AM 2 miles, PM 5 mile progression/tempo run. I started the first 2-3 miles easy and then picked up the pace for the rest of the run.
Sat. Aug 7 – 3 miles easy + core
Total week mileage = 30
By the end of August, I was doing 40-45 miles a week.
I opened the 2010 season at my home course, placed 2nd behind my friend, Meghan McGovern from North Penn, but I ran 40 seconds faster than I did last year, so it was awesome to see that improvement. Also my team won the meet, which was the first time since, I think 1989. The following week I ran at Belmont Plateau; it was a lot of fun, because our team got the experience of running together against some top-notch competition. I ran 13 seconds faster than the week before and on a tougher course so I am already starting to see myself progress.
I’ve felt really good this week. This is how my days broke up training-wise.
Sun, Sep 19 – Ran 11 miles easy @ 7:15-7:30 pace
Mon, Sep 20 – 30 min pool run + core
Tues, Sep 21 – 8.5 miles @ easy pace + 6 strides + hurdle drills
Wed, Sep 22 – Dual Meet vs Hatboro Horsham. 5 minute warm up, drills, stretch, 10 minute jog, 5K – 20:10?, 4x200 @ 38 sec, 15 minute cool down
Thurs, Sep 23 – 9.5 miles easy + 6 strides + core
Fri, Sep 24 – 8.5 miles easy + 6 strides
Sat, Sep 25 – 10 minute warm up, drills, stretch, 6 strides and 7x1000 on a 1000m loop on our xc course. The first 2x1000 were supposed to be at 5 mile race pace my goal time was 3:47 with 90 seconds recovery. I ran those in 3:50 and 3:51. They felt comfortable and even though I didn’t hit my time I wasn’t concerned because I knew the next 5 were going to be tough. The next part of the workout was 5x1000 @ 5k race pace, my goal time was 3:41 with 3 minutes recovery. My times were 3:33, 3:36, 3:35, 3:34, 3:28. Then ran a 25 minute cool down and core. This was my first interval workout, and it felt awesome!
On Wednesday, after our dual meet, a couple of my teammates; Veronica, Ginny, Sarah and I went to a fundraiser to benefit the making of the documentary film on Catherine Ndereba, a Kenyan runner who is a 2x Olympic Medalist in the Marathon. It was awesome to meet her. She has gone through a lot to become a great runner, and it was very inspiring to hear her story!
My next test will be a dual meet at Pennridge against them and North Penn on Wednesday. I’ll definitely want to see an improvement on my time from last year. Good luck to everyone this week!
-Katie
Check out the Journal from Altoona Area senior Wade Endress