More and more athletes are competing in
long-distance events
year-round.
TURNER – The eyes of the Leavitt High School girls’ distance running team glimmer when the Hornets hear it.
“Crazy?” asks Kira Beeckel. “Sometimes I think I am, but not really. It’s just fun.”
The reason for the question of sanity is Beeckel’s choice of sports. In the fall, she runs cross country. In the winter, she is a cross country skier, and in the spring she runs the long distance events for the track team.
“Originally I am a skier,” said Beeckel. “I do the other ones just to help me stay in shape for skiing.”
Beeckel’s habits, and those of her distance-running teammates, are actually quite common among several of the top schools in each of those sports.
Last season, Fryeburg Academy and Leavitt finished in a dead heat for the Class B cross country running crown. This winter, Leavitt took the Class A skiing crown, while Fryeburg took the Nordic skiing title in Class B. And this spring both schools will be relying on strong distance teams to battle for second place in Class B track, assuming that Greely, another strong team in all three sports, lives up to its billing as the favorite.
“You see a definite correlation there,” said Leavitt coach Tina Meserve. “The events are so similar in what they require the athletes to know how to do that they tend to use all three seasons as a training tool.”
Endurance factor
The most common trait associated with all three sports is endurance.
“It’s a very aerobic activity,” said EL boys’ coach Dan Campbell. “They all have to be in peak physical shape with regards to stamina at all times, and that’s what draws a lot of the athletes to these sports.”
Campbell coaches all three teams in question at EL, and all three have done well with the same basic cast of characters in all three sports.
“All of these sports are those that you can’t leave alone for a season and come back to them,” said Meserve. “In hockey or baseball, once the season is over, you can go and do something else, come back to it at the beginning of the next season and still be good after a few rusty practices. With running, if you don’t train all the time, you lose so much.”
Success rate
From the end of the spring track season last year, Meserve’s athletes at Leavitt made a commitment to try and win state titles in cross country and skiing. They went 1-for-2 in that venture, thanks in part to the cross country team at Fryeburg Academy.
“One of the reasons we have success in distance events in the spring is because of the workout most of them get in the fall and winter,” said Fryeburg coach Mark Strange. “One of the things you can do with so many good athletes coming through like that is branch them out in spring track, and that adds even more quality to the team.”
Leavitt, Fryeburg and EL are just three schools that can boast strong teams in all three sports. Yarmouth, Greely, Telstar and Maranacook are among some of the other schools to which this trend applies.
“Overall, some of the best athletes in the state are participating in these events,” said Campbell. “There’s no question in my mind that they are all related. All three require tenacity, steadfast attention to detail, and they have to think at the same time that they are running or skiing. That can be hard to do.”
Trending upward
Kira Beeckel and Taylor Leavitt were new to cross country running last fall. Both Leavitt runners earned a place in the top 13 in the state meet, and both improved considerably their finish times in cross country skiing.
Last winter, 15 of the 20 athletes who qualified to be a part of the Eastern High School skiing championships were also members of their school’s cross country running team. That number is up, only slightly, from the previous year.
“More and more people are realizing how much effort goes into being the best in any of those three sports,” said Meserve. “It’s great training, no matter which of the sports is your favorite.”
As for being crazy for participating in all three high-endurance sports, most of the athletes tend to agree.
“When you’re out alone in the middle of the trail, or just finishing your third lap, you ask yourself, ‘Why?’ said Leavitt. “I tell myself I must be crazy. But at the same time, it’s about being around all of the other people that do it, being around a dedicated bunch of teammates. We saw last year that eventually, all of the hard work involved in theses sports can pay off in the long run.”
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