Welcome to Cross Country!!!!
2020 Mahwah Youth Cross Country
Please feel free to email me with any questions you may have at pcjrrun@att.net or call me at (862) 881-2216.
2020 Mahwah Youth Cross Country
Welcome everyone to the 2020 Mahwah Youth Cross Country program. We are looking forward to build up the program in our seventh year of existence as one of the premiere youth programs in the state. I will be meeting with all parents & kids on Tuesday, September 3rd @ 7:00pm at Continental Soldiers Park Gazebo, with the first day of practice on Wednesday Sept 6th at the Mahwah High School Track & Field. Please note that your child must turn 7 in 2020. Your child can be 14 years old in 2020 but must be in 8th grade in 2020-21 school year.
The practice schedule will be as follows. All Wednesday Practices will be at Mahwah High School Track from 5:00 to 6:00 pm.
All Saturday Practices will be held at the following locations around Mahwah from 9:30 am – 10:30 am:
Mahwah H.S. Sept 5 @ 9:00 am please note the start time
Ramapo Reservation Sept 12th, Sept 19th, Oct 3rd, Oct 17th
Darlington County Park Oct 31st time TBD the practice will be after the Bergen County Meet of Champions
The meet schedule, all on Sundays at Mahwah High School are as follows:
Sept 27th, Oct 11th, Oct 25th
The first race begins at 9:30 with the last race finishing up at 11:30 pm. All runners should show up by 9:00 am so as to get their race numbers and warm up properly. As in previous years, I am asking all runners to help out during the meet as watchers to help the other kids go in the right direction.
Boys & Girls will be running together in each age group but will be scored seperately. Whatever age you child turns in 2019 is the age group they run in. e.g. if your child turns 9, 11 or 13 in 2020 they run in that age group!
The race distances for each age group are as follows:
7-8 year olds 1,500 meters, 9-10 & 11-12 year olds 3,000 meters, 13-14 year olds 4,000 meters
We will be having an end of the year pizza party after a Wednesday practice at a place to be determined in Mahwah. Please feel free to email me with any questions you may have at pcjrrun@att.net or call me at (862) 881-2216.
As in track practices, bathrooms are closed and please bring your own water. Practices will be called only in the event of a major downpour/lightning. Meets will be held in the rain but will be held up if there is lightning. The meets this year will have more athletes in each race as this program grows and we forward to your participation.
Below is the recommended training schedule for all runners to do over the summer. It is meant as a guide and not mandatory but unlike track & field, all kids need to be in some sort of shape since the first meet is within the first two weeks of practice and races are run on grass & dirt and require a lot more effort to finish. Any questions feel free to contact me at pcjrrun@att.net or call me 862-881-2216.
This season The USATF-NJ meet as well as the Region 2 meet will be held in Deer Path Park in Flemington NJ (an hour from Mahwah) and since the only requirement to run the regional meet is to run the state meet, I will be encouraging the kids to be training for that. The USATF-Cross Country Junior Olympics will be held in Lexington, KY on Dec 12th. (Only a 90 minute ride from Cincinnati or Louisville airports) or as far as Myrtle Beach SC 710 mile car ride. So its a reasonable effort for those finishing in the top 30 in the regional meet to go to Nationals.
Thanks!
Coach Pete Cassotis
Mahwah Youth Cross Country Commissioner
Summer Training Schedule
Beginning this week of July 1st, I am asking all kids to run 10-20 minutes non-stop three days per week. Speed is not important however running non-stop is. If you are still playing team sports or on the swimming team remember that you can cut down the workouts to 1-2 days per week. The younger kids should go to the 10 minute side and the older one should go up to 20 minutes for each workout on the week of July 19th.
The week of July 12th, everyone should increase their running to 15-25 minutes, non-stop still only 3 days per week. Speed again is not important, endurance is and getting use to running non-stop is also important. The 7-10 year olds should be toward the 15 minute range and the 11-14 year olds are to be toward the 25 minute range. Do not have them run on back to back days as they will need time to recover.
Beginning the week of August 3rd, all running should be in full swing 7-8 year olds 15-20 minutes, 9-12 year olds 20-25 minutes, and 13-14 year olds from 20-30 minutes three days per week. During this time speed now gets put into their runs which are non-stop but they should be going full speed 1-2 minute in stretches at least twice per each workout. The younger kids going 1 minute and the older ones going 2 minutes long. Again endurance is the key, but they need to get use to some speed to make them better runners.
If anyone has any questions, feel free to drop me a line or you can reach me at 862-881-2216.
See you on September 1st!
Thanks
Coach Pete Cassotis
Mahwah Youth Cross Country Commissioner