Old Skool Classic
Wolcott Mill Farm Learning Center
Saturday, September 26, 2015
BOYS WIN !!!! Girls place 3rd
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Girls Results
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Boys Results
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By Chuck Klonke
@MIPrepZoneMD
Cross country seasons can be a grind.
There are countless hours of practice that start almost as soon as one season ends. Runners log hundreds of miles to prepare for the next season.
That’s why an event like the Old Skool Classic Cross Country Race is something that runners from middle school to high school and beyond look forward to.
“Around this time of year there are a whole bunch of meets that are incredibly competitive,” said Armada coach Rob Blume. “This is more of a festival attitude. It puts the country back into cross country.”
The meet, which is run by the Armada and Romeo cross country programs, is held at the Wolcott Mills Farm Center in Ray Township. The course has hay bale barriers in a corn field, two river crossings, a twisting trail in the woods, and some muddy areas.
“It has grown since we started 10 years ago,” said Jason Hundey, who coaches at Armada with Blume. “Today we had close to 2,000 runners. You see the tough mudder and warrior dash races becoming more popular with college kids. You wonder if it’s a lot of these kids who ran for the schools that came to this meet.
“The kids get a taste for that type of race. Our football team came today and ran just for fun.”
The event starts at 8 a.m. with a sixth-grade race. It finishes with an open race around 1 p.m. The high school teams start racing at 10 a.m.
“We always feel bad for whoever has to race at the end of the day because the mud is far worse than it is for the people who go through it for the first time,” Hundey said. “The middle schoolers usually get the best conditions — except for the bees today.”
T-shirts are designed by elementary students in the Armada district. There is a DJ playing music which had to be popular at least 20 years ago.
Although the race is designed to be a fun part of the season, teams also take it seriously.
Dakota’s boys won the team championship for the larger schools, while Regina won the girls championship for the smaller schools.
The Cougars could have also won a trophy for being the cleanest group.
“We’re a tight-knit group of runners,” said Dakota’s Dan Westarb. “We like to train together. We all ran together, pushed each other and stayed out of the muck. We like to run a clean race and see the course for what it is.”
Westarb has run the race before.
“We like the challenge of it,” he said. “Once you get used to running hard on a slower course when you get to the fast courses like the district and regional you start running better because you’ve run in these kind of conditions. I ran a steeplechase race in the summer and this is reminiscent of that. This is good training for the faster courses at the end of the season.”
Dakota coach Mike Timpa said the Cougars welcome the meet.
“We run some more serious races on either end of this,” he said. “We just ask the kids to compete. We don’t expect them to PR. It gives them some perspective about cross country courses. At the end of the year when you’re running fast courses you think about running through the river and up the mud hill. The kids like it and we do it for them. It’s a race that breaks up the monotony of going to a regular invitational and being all business. It’s a little more laid-back.
“The only thing we ask of the kids that when they put on Dakota’s uniform they have some pride in the uniform and give a good effort. We don’t have kids who are intentionally swimming in the mud. After the race if they want to fool around during the cool down, that’s fine, but during the race we want them to be serious and have some pride for their school and themselves. They did that well.”
The meet is one of the highlights of Regina’s season.
“The kids love it,” said Saddlelites coach Gregg Golden. “They have a great time running and they all dive in the mud afterward. Rob Blume and Mike Buslepp (Romeo) and Mark Urquhart (Warren-Mott) do a great job running it. The kids look forward to it. It’s one of the highlights of our year.
“The course is different. It comes at a good point in the season. Everybody has been working hard and it’s good to have a fun meet. We take it seriously, but it’s a fun meet before you get into the real serious part of the season. We had a good day today, but effort is never a problem with this team.”
Regina’s Monica VanBerkum has been running in the meet for four years. It’s one of the highlights of every season she has been on the team.
“It’s just so different,” she said. “You have the rivers and the terrain is so different. We still try hard but it’s just a lot of fun. I usually hate the second mile, but in this race I’m all about the second mile because it’s the river and the mud. It’s definitely more excitement than usual.
“First you go out around the corn field and jump over bales for hurdles. Then you go in the woods, cross the river and there’s mud for 200 meters. Then you cross the river again, have a little more woods and a hill and then flip back around by the cows for the finish. We never see cows anywhere else.”
The format for deciding the team champions is different from most cross country invitationals. Ninth graders only race against ninth graders and so on, but each of the class races figure into a team’s final score. A first place in the ninth grade race counts as one point in the team totals. A first in the 10th grade race is also one point. The team score can be determined by ninth and 10th graders, which is rarely the case.
“We were second today (in the Orange Division for the smaller schools) and it was because of the way our ninth grade boys finished,” Blume said. “If they finished first in their race — even if they got beat by 75 seniors — it’s still one point for us. In a normal race those freshmen and sophomores would be beaten out by juniors and seniors.”
The Old Skool Classic is definitely here to stay.
“A lot of coaches have told us that their kids don’t care which meets are on the schedule, but this one better be on it,” Blume said.
@MIPrepZoneMD
Cross country seasons can be a grind.
There are countless hours of practice that start almost as soon as one season ends. Runners log hundreds of miles to prepare for the next season.
That’s why an event like the Old Skool Classic Cross Country Race is something that runners from middle school to high school and beyond look forward to.
“Around this time of year there are a whole bunch of meets that are incredibly competitive,” said Armada coach Rob Blume. “This is more of a festival attitude. It puts the country back into cross country.”
The meet, which is run by the Armada and Romeo cross country programs, is held at the Wolcott Mills Farm Center in Ray Township. The course has hay bale barriers in a corn field, two river crossings, a twisting trail in the woods, and some muddy areas.
“It has grown since we started 10 years ago,” said Jason Hundey, who coaches at Armada with Blume. “Today we had close to 2,000 runners. You see the tough mudder and warrior dash races becoming more popular with college kids. You wonder if it’s a lot of these kids who ran for the schools that came to this meet.
“The kids get a taste for that type of race. Our football team came today and ran just for fun.”
The event starts at 8 a.m. with a sixth-grade race. It finishes with an open race around 1 p.m. The high school teams start racing at 10 a.m.
“We always feel bad for whoever has to race at the end of the day because the mud is far worse than it is for the people who go through it for the first time,” Hundey said. “The middle schoolers usually get the best conditions — except for the bees today.”
T-shirts are designed by elementary students in the Armada district. There is a DJ playing music which had to be popular at least 20 years ago.
Although the race is designed to be a fun part of the season, teams also take it seriously.
Dakota’s boys won the team championship for the larger schools, while Regina won the girls championship for the smaller schools.
The Cougars could have also won a trophy for being the cleanest group.
“We’re a tight-knit group of runners,” said Dakota’s Dan Westarb. “We like to train together. We all ran together, pushed each other and stayed out of the muck. We like to run a clean race and see the course for what it is.”
Westarb has run the race before.
“We like the challenge of it,” he said. “Once you get used to running hard on a slower course when you get to the fast courses like the district and regional you start running better because you’ve run in these kind of conditions. I ran a steeplechase race in the summer and this is reminiscent of that. This is good training for the faster courses at the end of the season.”
Dakota coach Mike Timpa said the Cougars welcome the meet.
“We run some more serious races on either end of this,” he said. “We just ask the kids to compete. We don’t expect them to PR. It gives them some perspective about cross country courses. At the end of the year when you’re running fast courses you think about running through the river and up the mud hill. The kids like it and we do it for them. It’s a race that breaks up the monotony of going to a regular invitational and being all business. It’s a little more laid-back.
“The only thing we ask of the kids that when they put on Dakota’s uniform they have some pride in the uniform and give a good effort. We don’t have kids who are intentionally swimming in the mud. After the race if they want to fool around during the cool down, that’s fine, but during the race we want them to be serious and have some pride for their school and themselves. They did that well.”
The meet is one of the highlights of Regina’s season.
“The kids love it,” said Saddlelites coach Gregg Golden. “They have a great time running and they all dive in the mud afterward. Rob Blume and Mike Buslepp (Romeo) and Mark Urquhart (Warren-Mott) do a great job running it. The kids look forward to it. It’s one of the highlights of our year.
“The course is different. It comes at a good point in the season. Everybody has been working hard and it’s good to have a fun meet. We take it seriously, but it’s a fun meet before you get into the real serious part of the season. We had a good day today, but effort is never a problem with this team.”
Regina’s Monica VanBerkum has been running in the meet for four years. It’s one of the highlights of every season she has been on the team.
“It’s just so different,” she said. “You have the rivers and the terrain is so different. We still try hard but it’s just a lot of fun. I usually hate the second mile, but in this race I’m all about the second mile because it’s the river and the mud. It’s definitely more excitement than usual.
“First you go out around the corn field and jump over bales for hurdles. Then you go in the woods, cross the river and there’s mud for 200 meters. Then you cross the river again, have a little more woods and a hill and then flip back around by the cows for the finish. We never see cows anywhere else.”
The format for deciding the team champions is different from most cross country invitationals. Ninth graders only race against ninth graders and so on, but each of the class races figure into a team’s final score. A first place in the ninth grade race counts as one point in the team totals. A first in the 10th grade race is also one point. The team score can be determined by ninth and 10th graders, which is rarely the case.
“We were second today (in the Orange Division for the smaller schools) and it was because of the way our ninth grade boys finished,” Blume said. “If they finished first in their race — even if they got beat by 75 seniors — it’s still one point for us. In a normal race those freshmen and sophomores would be beaten out by juniors and seniors.”
The Old Skool Classic is definitely here to stay.
“A lot of coaches have told us that their kids don’t care which meets are on the schedule, but this one better be on it,” Blume said.