Sleep

I hate to be the one to break it to the kids, but you only have 9 days left until school starts!  One of the most important back-to-school activities for Cross Country runners is to adjust to the new daily schedule.  A key component to this adjustment is getting sufficient sleep.  It is almost impossible to adjust overnight from waking up in the 8-10am time-frame, to waking up at 6am or so.  Trying to do so will cause the same effects as jet lag!  The change should be gradual over the next week, so that your body is not shocked next Wednesday.

Most high school runners could really use 9 hours of sleep per night; however, most high school students are not disciplined enough to be in bed by 9:30pm or so, to get the nine hours.  If you are not one of the few that can be effective in school and in training on significantly less sleep, you need to develop the discipline to schedule enough sleep!

Here are links to a couple of my favorite Runner's World articles on sleep: the first one helps you find out how much sleep you need (you still have time to do their experiment).  The second one shares some quick tips for sleeping the night before a race.

And finally, a more comprehensive article can be found at the Running Research News site.