Congratulations Baylor University Women: Second Place at Big 12 Championships!
10 November 2008
The Baylor University women’s cross country team finished second overall at the 2008 Big 12 Cross Country Championships. The second-place finish ties the best finish for Baylor in Big 12 history. Baylor’s top runner finished third overall with a time of 20:45.35, claiming her second all-conference honor, with her first all-conference honor as a freshman in 2005. The third-place finish is the second-highest for a Baylor runner in Big 12 history, and the highest individual finish for Baylor in a decade. Read more about the meet on the Baylor website.
Baylor’s Head Coach Harbour, the fastest collegiate miler in NCAA history (3:50), is trying some new methods this year to help his athletes achieve their peak performance. Along with heart rate monitors for all the runners, Coach Harbour is using TrainingPeaks to help him analyze the data and plan workouts for the women’s cross country and track teams. “I’m able to look at their heart rate monitors,” says Coach Harbour. “We’re downloading all of our stuff into TrainingPeaks and we’re anxious to see what it gives us back. We’re basically just getting as much objective data as we can get right now, to have a good overall picture with that.”
So far this year, all that data seems to be helping. Last year, a lack of objective data presented a challenge for the team’s overall performance during the season. “We got a little bit carried away in the middle of the season last year,” admits Harbour. “We just got dead-legged. We barely got to Nationals. We ended up running pretty well once we got there, but I think I did my worst coaching job ever last year. I don’t want to make that mistake again this year.”
Watch the video below, from Flotrackr, to learn more about how the Baylor team is training for success this year. Commenting on the workout at Cottonwood Creek Golf Course featured in the video, Coach Harbour remarks, “This is such a good course, easy on the legs… the camera probably helped them run a little bit faster than I wanted them to, they got a little carried away, but it was a good day.” You can also read more about the Baylor women’s cross country team on the TrainingPeaks blog.
Keep an eye on Baylor when the women return to action on November 15 as the Bears host the NCAA South Central Regional meet at Cottonwood Creek Golf Course, a course featured in the video of the workout below.
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