Last time out the Jays ran in the Greater Louisville Cross Country Classic in Kentucky. Next up, the Jays head to Peoria to run in the Bradley Classic in their final tune up before the MVC Championships on October 30th hosted by Indiana St.
Before the teams are off an running, head coach Chas Davis took the time to answer a few questions about the upcoming meet.
White & Blue Review: At the mid-point of the season, how’s the health of the team? Any injuries that will prevent anyone from running?
Chas Davis: No serious injuries to the squad we expect to take to MVC and NCAA Regionals at this point. Our top three are back fully healthy and Quinn Biever seems to be managing a tight IT band well enough to make it a small to non-factor. I credit a lot of this to our student-athletes communicating aches & pains to us early in the season so we could be smart. However, with a badly rolled ankle and virus this week, Tin Nguyen will not be competing today and we decided to red-shirt Jason Pang this season. You always want to knock on wood at this time of year as intense as our training will continue to be & flu-season kicking into gear.
CD: I look to everyone on the team for leadership as they have all stepped up in their own way. From our 1st to our 7th girl, they have all contributed something very important to the team dynamic this season.
CD: A Friday afternoon race honestly changes more up on the back end than the front end of the week/training cycle. We cut out a workout we may have otherwise done this week and “add” it to next week if it works for us since we have more recovery time after this race. Otherwise, it’s different from a mental and fueling stand point since we usually do not have all-day to stew about a race and make sure we’re not going into the race without having eaten since breakfast. Routine on race day is important to runners, so it’s just a matter of planning ahead to adjust a bit. Fortunately, we have many track races in the evenings in the winter and spring and freshmen are often coming in from afternoon races in high school.
CD: Culhane is still making his way back to 100% after a little time off his legs in the beginning of the season and a cold two weeks ago, but we’re excited that he’s just about back there and should be at full strength in two weeks for MVC.
CD: We’re gunning for Drake on the women’s side & UNI on the men’s side. If we don’t hunt them down, I believe we’ll be close & will give us concrete goals for MVC now that we’ll have seen them for the first time this season. If we do take them today, it’ll be a great confidence boost heading into Championship Season.
CD: We give them a weekend away to train on their own before starting back up as a team with a workout Tuesday afternoon of fall break. From there, we just get to train without any class & hopefully few distractions in Omaha. It can be a great time to come closer as a team & catch up on rest & recovery. What we see in the race today will determine what workouts we see next week, although I do have a pretty good idea of what will prepare us well for conference.
