​Summer workouts help young Eagles build continuity

by Michael Smith


Summer is one of the most important times of the year for the Grain Valley cross country team.

That couldn’t be more true for the 2023 boys and girls cross country squads as head coach Nick Small and the Eagles will depend a lot on underclassmen in the fall.

From June until late August, Grain Valley holds five running sessions per week at different locations to get some miles in before the regular season starts.

“These kids have been getting mileage in since track season,” Small said. “They put in hard efforts every week.”

“We are bringing in quite a few freshmen and some sophomores that have matured. We are definitely younger with all of the runners we graduated last year.”

With a bevy of newcomers entering the fold, the summer workouts are more critical than ever as Small looks for his team to build continuity.

“One of the biggest things is the team bonding,” Small said. “We want them to get used to each other. You’re coming off a season in track where there is togetherness and then there is fragmentation because of the graduations.

“It’s GV cross country 2023. What does that look like? In a sport like this when you are outside and it’s hot and you’re tired, you want to get out there and run for that kid next to you. If you form that relationship with everyone and that family aspect over the summer, that goes a long way.”

Not only does it help with team bonding, it helps with conditioning, especially for the younger kids who may not be used to going at a pace to keep up with high school athletes.

“Right now, our focus is to build up a lot of mileage,” Grain Valley senior Kayley Bell said.

Our team is so young and they don’t have a lot of experience. Previous we have had really old teams so this is new for us.”

To aid in building chemistry, the runners sometimes get together and participate in activities outside of just running.

“Coming in and running cross country as a freshman is not an easy thing to do,” Grain Valley senior Rylan Smith said. “Being brand new, you may not know a lot of things. Sometimes we all group together before we start running.”

“We will do some group activities like play pickleball. We also have games we play when we run. We call one “Wavelength.” Then we also go out and eat breakfast sometimes.”

The annual Twilight Relays, which will take place today, helps with the team bonding aspect, also. It’s an event where current cross country runners get together with alumni and they play games at the school track from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. Some of the games include spike ball and relay races.

“I get to see a lot of my friends that I ran with when I was younger,” Bell said of the benefits of the Twilight Relays. “It’s a lot of fun.”

Small said he likes to have some variety in regard to the courses his team practices on. He said he likes to mix it up and the Eagles practice on some easier courses and on some more difficult ones to get used to what the regular season will be like.

This year, Small has added some new trails in Unity Village and in Lake Jacomo to his course list. He also has had his team run on the Little Blue Trace, Rock Island and Vista Trail the past couple of seasons. They also run on the Grain Valley track, as well.

“We mostly like to run on soft surfaces to prevent injury and avoid wear and tear on the body,” Small said. “We like the variety of terrain so we can get on hills here and there.”

While both the boys and girls teams may be young, runners like Bell and Smith have set high goals for themselves for the 2023 season, and getting warmed up during the summer is just the beginning.

“I want to make it to state,” said Bell, who finished 46th at the Class 5 District 4 meet last season. “I need to get a lot of (personal records) this year to make that happen.”
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Added Smith, who qualified for state and finished 91st in 2022: “I am more of a track guy but I am really focusing on cross country this year. I want to get my times down. I have been working on getting my miles. Right now I am running 55 miles (per week). I want to get that up to 60.”

​Grain Valley senior Kayley Bell said summer workouts are important for the cross country team so younger runners can get mileage in. Photo credit: Michael Smith

Grain Valley senior Rylan Smith said he's more of a track guy but focusing more on cross country this season and wants to decrease his times from last season. Photo credit: Michael Smith