With the start of the new track season, athletes are working harder than ever before, dominating the league and reaching new heights.
This newfound success seems to be caused by the exponential increase in members.
“One of the newest changes was a bunch of new kids,” head coach Tony Crutchfield said.
The immense influx of athletes could be directly attributed to the head coach’s first-year success. As someone who firmly believes in the athletes’ success, it was inevitable that a second year would bring more members.
Starting this season, the athletes utilized the weight room to develop endurance strength and gain muscle. In previous years, failure to utilize the weight room caused their shortcomings. However, with this, the athletes can boost sprinting speeds and jumping heights.
“I feel great, well established with the team, administration, and athletes,” Crutchfield said. “With the foundation I laid last year, athletes understand the program better, and perform better in the 8-week cycle.”
Every one of the kids participating in track has big ambitions for the league, training hard every day to gradually improve. The team hopes to see large overall improvements in the individual events.
“I want to lead the team as team captain for my second year and also win the league title in the 400-meter dash,” team captain Maximiliano Wu said.
According to Crutchfield, the implemented 8-week cycle is a training plan to boost student performances and skills. The students start with endurance training, continuing on to speed endurance and then absolute speed. They created this system to develop an athlete’s speed and endurance with merged tactics and a strategic approach to training.
“One of the most noticeable meets so far was the California Winter Championship because the Varsity Boys ran a top 10 time in the 4X200 relay,” Wu said.
As the track team proceeds with the season, they edge closer to more diverse meets such as Arcadia, the number one track meet in the state, the Mt. SAC Meet, and hopefully CIF finals.
So far in the season, one athlete has qualified to attend Arcadia, one of the most prominent track meets of the year. As the year progresses, the team is hoping to see more members qualify for this prestigious competition.
The team’s next meet is at home against Rowland High School on April 18.
