As in years past, during "Winter" or "Indoor" Track, Cherokee focuses on preparing for the Spring season. Coaches concentrate on base and strength training for the distance athletes, and skills and conditioning for the sprinters, jumpers and throwers. Even so, the team participates in a number of meets -- some of which are not reported here -- for both experience and a change of pace.
Through December and into January, the "winter" weather here in New Jersey has been unusually mild, with the temperatures reaching into the 50s, and that allowed the team to train in "some comfort" on Cherokee's outdoor facilities. That's not likely to continue, however, as the weather cools and the team prepares for the seriously cold weather and hot competition of the winter season!
4th Annual South Jersey Throw Down, Meet # 1
On December 18, 2012, Cherokee hosted the first of a series of meets for the Shot Putters of the region, The South Jersey Throw Down, Meet # 1. In it, Senior Mike Conway threw his first shot of the season 44' 3"! Further details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
Track Universe High School Invitational
On December 28, 2012, a depleted -- winter break -- team bussed to the New York City Armory for the grandly-named Track Universe High School Invitational, a small event that allowed the team to compete on what is said to be the fastest indoor track in the world. It is, then, ironic, that it would take the team longer to bus to Armory than ever before as it got caught-up in seasonal traffic on the longest parking lot in the nation, the New Jersey Turnpike!
The meet directors saw fit to report only on the top finishers in the various events at: MileSplit.New York.
South Jersey Track Coaches Association, Large Schools Relays
On January 2, 2011, Cherokee runners opened their indoor season by traveling to the Bennett Center in Toms River, NJ for the first in a series of meets sponsored by the SJTCA: The South Jersey Track Coaches Association, Meet # 1. This relay meet was largely a training session with the coaches testing different combinations in various relay events but Mike Conway did well this early in the season, putting his shot 45' 9.50" to take 6th in the competition.
Further details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
South Jersey Track Coaches Association, Large Schools Meet
On January 7, 2012, a partial Cherokee team -- most of the distance squad and many of the sprinters stayed home -- traveled to the Bennett Center in Toms River for the South Jersey Track Coaches Association, Large Schools Meet. Of the various performances, the most encouraging were that of Javon Bell, who showed great potential in the 55m Dash, and Brandon Arencibia, in the 1600m Run!
Details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
The pictures from the meet are "way substandard" because, for photographers, the Bennett Center is still dark as your pocket! Like everything else in Track, get used to it!
NJSIAA State Relay Championship: Group IV Boys
On January 11, 2012, the team returned to the Bennett Center for the NJSIAA State Relay Championship: Group IV Boys. It was a rough time for the team as they dropped the baton in the 4 X 200m Relay and were DQ'd, and failed to appear on time in the 4 X 1600m Relay . . . what is that?! Some light appeared at the end of the tunnel, however, in the Distance Medley Relay where Kaleb Burch, Mike Hare, Brandon Illagan and Shawn Wilson took 6th of 43 teams.
Details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
Lawrenceville Dual Meet
On January 12, 2012, just to see how the 1% lives, a significant part of the team traveled to the Lawrenceville School for the annual Lawrenceville Dual. To put a light spin on the results, Cherokee got spanked! Several performances made it to the scoreboard including Shawn Tracey with a 2nd in the 55m Dash and a 3rd in the 400m Dash; Mike Conway with a 2nd in the Shot; Mike Hare with a 3rd in the 800m Run; Ronnie Oxendine with a 3rd in the 200m Dash; and Jason Kramer with 3rds in the High Jump and the Triple Jump. A special cheer goes out to Brandon Arencibia who dropped more than twelve seconds off his PR in the Mile, hitting 4:50.98!
Grim details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
Olympic Conference Meet, # 1
On January 15, 2012, members of the team traveled to the Bennett Center for an Olympic Conference Meet, the first of two Conference "practice" meets at Bennett and opportunities to set decent seeding times for the upcoming Sectional meet. For example, Shawn Wilson and Brandon Arencibia competed in the 3200m: Shawn took 1st . . . nothing record-breaking but enough to get into the seeded heat at Sectionals, and Brandon took 8th, set a PR and set himself up for a decent Sectional seeding! Others raced as well and their pictures are below. Further details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.
Olympic Conference Meet, # 2 and The Lavino Relays
On January 19, 2012, Cherokee sent team members to two different meets: the Lavino Relays at the Lawrenceville School; and the Olympic Conference Meet, # 2 at the Bennett Center.
At Lavino, despite having Fully Automatic Timing, the meet director chose to report only the top six scoring teams in each race, and, since Cherokee is on none of those lists, the omission is not a bad thing! Remember Mom's admonition: "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all!" At the Conference Meet, all the results were reported but Cherokee had no athletes among the top scorers. As a result, January 19th will go down in the annals as "just another day of indoor training."
Though there was no Long Jump competition at the Conference Meet, Senior Mike Hare made the highest and longest leap of the day midway through the 800m Run! Not sure what happened but Mike literally somersaulted high and wide of the pack landing awkwardly some 6 to 8 feet away! To his credit, he returned to the race but that gymnastic feat knocked "the race" out of him and he finished "out of the money!"
Details from the Olympic Conference Meet are at: NJRunners/MileSplit. And there are some marginal pictures from the Conference meet:
4th Annual South Jersey Throw Down, Meet # 3
On January 22, 2013, Cherokee hosted the 4th Annual South Jersey Throw Down, Meet # 3 for Shot Putters in the area and Senior Mike Conway took 3rd with a throw of over 45'! Details at: NJRunners/MileSplit.