Bay Shore High School, cont.

* tell each athlete that they can be good individuals and still be team oriented. That is the good thing about XC.

* only a few times will an athlete be asked to make a sacrifice.

* we have never had a selfish athlete. They all know the tradition of the team and want to be a part of that. Each athlete has a copy of the history of the team, and all-time lists.

Racing (as a team):

* each year and each team is different.

* most dual meets are run as a pack, usually with the better runners paired up with others to help them run faster. If it is a tough dual meet, we run that different.

* we stress the invitationals, especially the second half of the season. The first half of the season is to try different things, to get into the season, and to check out our fitness level. This aids us in setting up our training cycles. We run split squads for the first half of the season. We run freshman and sophomore races whenever possible.

* We don't like to run tough courses or highly competitive invitationals early. This disrupts our plans for the season. It is a long season!

Thoughts for the season:

* we have a very different team, having lost All-American Laura Cummings (UNC) and outstanding track runner Mary Liz McCurdy (Stanford) (also was 12th in Foot Locker Northeast Regional). We also losing Pam O'Sullivan (Fordham), an All-State runner.

* we have two very good xc runners in Lauren Schmidt with a pb of 18:30, and Callie Hogan 19:06, who has really blossomed this outdoor season! They should be in the top five in most of our invites.