Hard Work in High School: Preparation for the Track Season

90-degree weather; 30-degree weather; through rain, humidity, even snow. The circumstances aren’t an issue for sophomore Collin Abbott, who runs at the track multiple times a week to train for track. To be exact, Collin stated that he runs “at least two to three times a week” to prepare for the spring track season, and once track season starts, his training will intensify for sectionals. Hard work; his current training routine involves staying after school and heading to the track, starting with a warm-up consisting of A skips, B skips, high knees, butt kicks, Frankensteins, scoops, and karaokes. Then after these stretches, Collin runs 100m, 200m, 300m, and 400m sprints, for around 45 minutes. This is obviously a lot of work for one season, so what drives Collin to do it?  When asked about his motivations for his effort and training, he replied with a conventional answer: planning to use his success in track and field to obtain a college scholarship. Collin has had this same plan since he started running back in 6th grade. Another student who formerly ran alongside Collin is a very obvious example of this extreme effort: L&N Sophomore, Matthew Black; who trains six days a week, two of which are dedicated to sprint training, two days for long-jump training, and two days for long distance running, throughout the week he also dedicates time to strength training. Matthew’s strength training regimen is even more complex than his primary schedule, where Thursday and Monday he works on triceps, Tuesday and Friday go to back and bicep, and finally, Wednesday and Saturday go to leg and shoulder training. Similarly to Collin, Matthew warms up with a stretch exercise consisting of arm circles, shoulder mobility, lower back mobility, and ending with work on everything else. In his warmup, aside from his stretches, he does 50m sprints, 100m sled sprints, he cools down with a 200m, and then finishes with 50-meter starts, and work on blocks. And while these regimens seem intense for track season, both Collin and Matthew will begin to pick up the pace for their focus in order to train for sectionals.