Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Nothing like adversity...

Well, Saturday was the largest meet of the year...The Mountain West Classic in Missoula. Over 2000 runners participated! The meet was dominated by schools from Spokane. The #7 ranked girls team in the country, Shadle Park won the team title overwhelmingly. We were a distant 29th...primarily because yours truly had the team start slower than normal. This is a terrible strategy considering the number of athletes lined up for this race. We had to come from dead last to even place as high as we did. Great job girls.

Ahh, adversity...the weeds, the dead branches, the pot holes of a sports' season. Despite being disappointed in our overall performance and my own dereliction of duty, this situation, like most adversity required some weed pulling, pruning and pot-hole filling. There's nothing like adversity or disappointment to help a team and its coach get refocused. It provides some motivation to really excel, to refine goals and to challenge ourselves to meet potential. Good stuff! I can hardly wait for our next meet here in Hamilton.

Go Broncs!

Coach Albert

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Another Couple of Wins...















The varsity girls XC team posted their 3rd win of the season winning the Corvallis invitational with a score of 43 beating Corvallis, Darby, Anaconda, Dillon and Drummond. Up next is the "world famous" Mountain West Classic in Missoula. The meet starts at 9:30 with the JV boys and finish es with the middle-schoolers about 12:30.

Our Middle school boys won their third meet of the year as well. The Broncs were led by Easton Albert and Karil Apedaile (1st & 3rd respectively).

Additional pictures in this blog are of scenes from our first "ultimate football" game at practice on Friday and our team dinner on Thursday. As our team shirts say, "Life is good...cross country makes it better!"
Good luck this week Hamilton Broncs.


Coach Albert

Friday, September 11, 2009

A Perfect Score!


Congratulations to the Hamilton Lady Broncs XC team. Last weekend in a dual meet with Ronan, the ladies did something few can lay claim to...even in a dual meet. They achieved a perfect score! For those of you who don't know, XC is like golf, the lowest score wins. Points are awarded by place. For example first place gets one point, 2nd place gets 2 points, 3rd place gets 3 and so on. Our girls took the first 5 places in the Ronan Canal meet...15 points, the lowest score possible. Hats off to Coach Gale Decker and his daughter Noelle for puting on a terrific meet...please keep Mrs. Decker in your thoughts and prayers as she is in a serious battle with Lou Gehrig's Disease.

My pictures this week are from a "Hill repeat" practice of ours here in Hamilton. What a setting for practice huh?!! I absolutely adore this place I call home. It is truly God's country. On this September 11, let's remember what a blessing and privilege it is to live in this great country of ours and reside in such as special place like Hamilton Montana!

Good luck tomorrow in Anaconda. Go Broncs!

Coach Albert

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Ahh...fruits and veggies!


The last two weeks I have been inspired to drastically change my eating habits...primarily to fit into my dress pants for school which starts on Tuesday:)

As you can see from the pictures, fruit has been the main staple along with vegetables, nuts, fish, rice, yogurt, small whole wheat bagels...and of course, popcorn! I have completely avoided processed food, fried food, soda pop and really, all high sugar deserts. Water has been the primary beverage with an occasional juice or tea. I have allowed a small bit of dark chocolate so I don't completely go insane.

It's been good. I have more energy and have none of the side effects you get from eating all of the food listed above. I plan to add back moderate amounts of eggs, beef, pork and chicken. I hope I can be disciplined enough to continue this eating plan, it's obviously much healthier...especially for someone my age:)

In addition, I'm back to working out with much more intensity. I only spend 40 minutes in the weight room but attack arms, legs and abs in a way that leaves me exhausted. This is good. Just like shooting baskets, the more-game like intensity used during drills the more you'll get out of the workout. Just showing up is half the battle...the intensity will take you the rest of the way.

I encourage you all to eat healthier this school year. Be sure and get enough calories. You don't want to be in calorie deficit...you need the fuel! However, if you knew we could be one game or one meet better simply by eating more responsibly, would it be worth it? Would a state title be worth giving up pop and junk food for a few months? It would for me! Something to think about.

Go Broncs!

Coach Albert