Coaches Corner for April 14th: Maggie Lloyd, Ogden Track

Joining us on coach's corner here in KWBG, an opportunity to talk to Maggie Lloyd, Ogden track coach as a Bulldogs. Well, had been kind of running up against and pun intended, mother nature, and she is always undefeated. But Maggie had an opportunity to run last Friday in Jefferson at Green County. And then the boys had a chance to run at Southeast Valley last night. I know the winds weren't spectacular, but boy, it's nice to just get out there and get a meet in. It really is. It was refreshing to get out last week. And it was a little cold, but nothing that the kids couldn't handle. And yesterday was super warm, windy, which that's Iowa. So it was fun to compete and watch those kids do what they do best. Well, let's start with the boys because a record that has been standing for quite a while went down on Monday night. And I know those Monday night meets are never easy, especially just after prom weekend, I guess we didn't even bring that up, Maggie. We were kind of visiting off-air. But prom weekend, and I know senior trip is coming up. So I mean, there's a lot of excitement going on, not just for the seniors, but the other classmen can kind of feel that excitement level too. So the four by one, I know you had a chance to watch the junior high kids last night and be a part of that. But boy, that four by one team was cooking, huh? It really was. They ran it last Friday, and they were about a half a second off our school record last Friday. And so we tweaked some things, changed the order, and came in with them on Sunday. And we practiced handoffs again. And yeah, they were definitely tired from prom. But they are a very dedicated group of individuals. And so we came in, we practiced, and they just, they dominated. They took about a whole second off. And the first group in Ogden to break 44 seconds on the four by one. So they ran a 43.91. And yeah, broke the school record, and should qualify for the Drake Relays with that time. But we're super excited. Well, and this was something that Maggie, you and I talked in the preseason. I mean, this was a relay, and this was a record you wanted to take down, wasn't it? Yeah, it was. This was one of my goals as a sprint coach to put the boys in the best situation. Last year, our girls broke the four by one record and have qualified for the Drake Relays a few times. And they have graduated out to most of the girls that ran that. And so our girls are younger. Some of our distance girls are running that. But yeah, to put the boys in the situation to be successful, they've worked hard, and they burned that. Is that something, Maggie? And I know that, obviously, it worked out because the record goes down. But when you tweak a relay a little bit, in the back of your mind, are you going, oh, crud. Was this a great idea? Or I mean, is there that little bit of doubt that creeps in? Or did you feel pretty good about this? I felt really good about it. I think a couple of the kids were a little nervous, concerned. Once you've practiced something and you feel confident with what you did, it's hard to make changes. And there is not a large margin of error that you can do in the four by one to be successful. So like I told the boys on Sunday, I felt confident that they were dedicated enough. They're disciplined enough. And I didn't get to go to the meet last night, but I had the coaches remind them over and over, like, do not leave early. Do not trust your mark, you know, those things. And those kids are capable of doing that. And I mean, they definitely proved that last night. Well, something else that you put together, too, and we're going to talk more about Miles Trombley here in just a few. But he was a part of the Distance Medley team that finished first. And not just first, but like eight seconds first. That's pretty impressive at a distance medley to win it by that margin, Maggie. Yeah, absolutely. He had a split of 206 last night in the 800. And, you know, Cobb and I have both talked about, we didn't anticipate him being this quick this soon. And so we're super excited with where he's going to go and, you know, what races he's going to end up being in as the season progresses. But he is just, he's running very strong right now. And it's been fun to watch. Well, and not just in that distance medley, too, but I mean, he comes out and, Maggie, I think the one thing when you talk about your Milers and your two Milers is you can use them in different spots, but then you don't want to hurt them in those spots. Well, apparently didn't hurt him last night either, did it, Maggie? No, not at all. He was strong. He did well. Very, very well. That's impressive. Overall, when you had a chance to kind of look back at the results, Maggie, I know you were at the junior high meet, but overall, pretty pleased with what you saw in Gowrie? Yeah, really pleased. And, you know, they got a little time off, and then we're going to go to Perry as a team on Thursday, so we'll see what happens. All right, girls in Jefferson last Friday, and I know they're going to get a chance to run at Madrid tonight. What stood out for you from Jefferson last Friday for the ladies? You know, it was fun to watch. They ended up six overall out of a 12 team meet. The meet grew. With all the other meets getting canceled, a lot of teams needed to get in. So it was a 12 team meet. And they just really performed well and competed great against the other teams. You know, Sophie Sligman ended up winning the open four with a time of 64, 65. And that was fun to see her do really early on. And we've got some girls that can be really strong in the 400, which I enjoy watching some good fours. Well, I'll tell you something I enjoy watching. It's a good shuttle hurdle team, coach. And I wondered about what the shuttle was going to look like this year. Apparently, shuttle's looking just fine. I know you guys have kind of what is called your guys' gold standard. I know we've talked about that in the past. And I'll just explain it real quick, because I know where you're going with. I guess I could let you do it too. But it's basically what would have qualified for the previous season's year state meet. And that shuttle hurdle team put a real strong performance in, didn't they? Yeah, they really did. Yeah, they've hit our gold standard already. And that's the first time making it out there. So that's always fun to see. And tonight, when we go to Madrid, we get to actually put together two shuttle teams. We have enough girls that are wanting to be hurdlers and are competitive enough to be hurdlers that we have two full teams that get to compete tonight. And so that's always fun too. You've got backups. You've got people pushing each other. And yeah, they've hit the gold standard already. So I think their goal is to just keep getting better every meet. Maggie, I know you've had some meets that have been moved and changed, and you've lost and this and that. So I'm kind of interested, what's the plan of attack this week? Because you do have the girls that are going to run tonight in Madrid, but you also have your girls-only meet coming up on Thursday. So how do you attack the week with the ladies this week? You know, we try to not overdo it. To only have one day in between, we put a lot of thought into making sure that our athletes stay as healthy as possible. So keeping them, you know, we don't put the kids in four events just early on anyway, but we don't want that for a Tuesday, Thursday meet. So putting them in different situations to be successful here at Madrid. And then, yeah, probably a totally different line-up come Thursday. Yeah, that's what I was going to ask you about too, Maggie, because I know you guys really are proud of the home track. And I know you're proud of the blue oval, as I like to call it. And it's got to be tough to kind of probably tell some girls, hey, we're going to run you at Madrid, but we're not going to maybe run you in that insane event on Thursday. Do they kind of understand why, though? Yeah, they do. We try to be cognizant of explaining. Every meet is viewed differently. You can't stack every meet to try to win every meet, especially this early on. So we're focused on certain relays to try to get seed times down so that when the state qualifier meet, we're put in the fast heat. So we're constantly trying to analyze ways to get everybody in the best situation for the end of the season. And we're losing seniors next week, so trying to make sure that the seniors are in the relays, that we need them to be in this week. And then next week, what can we do without them? What can we stack? What can we do to utilize the meets to the best of everybody's ability without both seniors? Maggie, as always, thank you so much for some time. Best of luck tonight in Madrid. And we'll see you Thursday over in Ogden. Sounds great. Thank you. We get a chance to talk Ogden Track today. Maggie Lloyd joining us on Coach's Corner.