• Home
• About Us
  • Awards
• Ads Info
• Past issues
  • 2007 Past Issues
  • 2008 Past Issues
• Extras
  • Blogs
  • Election 2008 Coverage
  • Subscribe to HiLite Online
• Sports Stats
• Contact

Hounds train for post-season success

By David Zheng
<dzheng@hilite.org>

This school’s men’s cross-country team is inching closer to a State title for Head Coach Chuck Koeppen in his last season, with the Metropolitan Interscholastic Conference (MIC) Championships and Sectional meets just around the corner.

“I’d say that things are going well as of now because everybody seems to be in pretty good shape and fairly healthy,” Koeppen said. “(Team captain and senior) Logan Rosenberg has been somewhat injured which doesn’t help us. I think he’s rounding back into form, hopefully, but everybody else is healthy and ready to go so we should be good.”The MIC Championships and Sectional meets are on Oct. 8 and Oct. 14, respectively. With the MIC being just six days before the Sectional meet, the team has an opportunity to gauge its current level and perhaps gain some confidence headed into the Sectional.

“(The MIC) is important because it will allow us to see where we are at in our fitness and maybe gain some momentum going into the tournament,” Tom Ohlman, varsity runner and junior, said.

“I think you always would want to be conference champs. We won it last year, and normally we do win the conference, but it will be very competitive,” Koeppen said. “Terre Haute North is pretty good. North Central is very good. Warren (Central)’s not bad and Center Grove’s usually pretty good, so it will be a good meet that our kids can’t take lightly.”

However, Koeppen said he does not think that the men’s cross-country team has to worry too much about the MIC Championships headed into Sectional. “I always refer to the kids as rubber bands. If they don’t do well one meet, they’re just going to bounce back. But with people like me I might break,” Koeppen said. “I think these kids can run hard in the conference meet and run hard in the Sectional six days later.”

With such big meets coming up, the men’s cross-country team has started preparing by doing longer, harder and more up-tempo workouts.

“As your season progresses, your training does change,” Koeppen said. “We’ve upped our intensity, but we haven’t been doing a great deal of speed workouts. As they say, speed kills, and in a race you don’t really use speed a great deal either.”

Ohlman added, “We’ve just been trying to get our endurance up and starting to work on interval type speed workouts to increase our kick and turnover.”

Another main focus for the men’s cross-country team headed into MIC and Sectional is injuries. “The varsity team is just getting everyone healthy. Rosenberg was out with a hamstring injury, but he is now rounding into shape, and we are all ready for some tough competition come tournament time,” Ohlman said. “We are taking no chances with anyone getting hurt. We want everyone healthy when State rolls around.”

“I just go by what we have,” Koeppen said. “I just go with our top seven. If Logan’s one of them that’s great. If he’s not, we just have to move on. That’s all we can do. I hope he’s one of them, but if not we still have a great team and we’re up to the task so we just go with what we’ve got.”

According to Ohlman, the team has great depth and many runners that can step up in case of an injury. “The injury of one of the varsity runners would obviously be a blow to the team, but our team is very deep, meaning anyone not in the top seven could step up and perform like just another varsity runner,” Ohlman said. “It would seem we were all healthy, so we would still be able to perform close to our potential.”

Regardless, the team’s performance in the MIC and Sectional meets will be a step toward winning the State championship for Koeppen in his last season.

“We might not even have to go completely all out in the Sectional because they take the top five teams to the next round,” Koeppen said. “We don’t have to win the Sectional, but I’m pretty sure our kids will probably want to.”

Multimedia/Links »

Photo of the Day

PERFECT PRACTICE: Freshman Jeff Hou watches freshman Ray Qian practice on the piano in the orchestra room on Dec. 12 during 7th period. They frequently practice in preparation for future playing tests and performances. ARJUNA CAPULONG / PHOTO

View more photos >

Photo Essays

Cross Country State Meet - VICTORIOUS RUN: In Head Coach Chuck Koeppen's final season, the men's and women's cross-country capture both State titles, sending him off as a winner. NICK JOHNSON / PHOTOS

View more photos >