On April 7, the Francis Howell North varsity sprint team will head to the Northwest Invitational. Many schools will be attending this meet, so there’s no one opponent.  The sprinters have practiced every day this week and hope to do well on Saturday.

“This week we’ve had a lot of distance runs and baton work and we just had longer runs trying to stay in shape for the upcoming meet,” senior sprinter Josh Tanner said. “I actually think we need to improve our baton work. Last year we had great baton work but this year it’s been all over the place.”

The team has practiced vigorously all week and all year. Many other schools started practicing earlier than FHN and the sprinters are working hard to raise themselves to the next level. The team has had a big focus on the endurance side of sprinting and the coach has chosen higher intensity meets to raise the bar for the runners.

“Our strength is for sure our speed,” Tanner said. “We have a lot of people who are talented and know what they are doing, they just have to get the technique.  Our opponents this Saturday are very strong, they practice pretty hard and have more open field areas to run more. But our team has worked hard this week.”

After the Northwest Invitational, the runners have their Henle Holmes meet on April 12 and 13. Depending on how the meet goes, next week’s practice will either be very challenging for the runners or slightly easier.

“Our season has started off slow, we had a lot of younger kids, but so far we’re getting our feet underneath us,” coach Reed Lunsford said. “We’re also a lot stronger than we were last year for sure. We practiced outside every day this week and they worked their butts off.”