The 2008 Alta boys cross country team travels to Tempe, AZ to compete at the NXN Southwest Region XC Championships. Establishing themselves as one of the dominant teams in recent Utah State history, Alta looks to capitalize on their superb season with a National Championship berth. Currently ranked #25 Nationally by the Harrier Super 25.
At the beginning of the 2008 Utah cross country season Alta head coach knew he had a special team. Led by four dominant seniors, it was unclear who the #1 runner would be. It was clear that Murphy had a team that was determined to win the 5A State Championship.
The 2008 Utah State Championships will go down as one of the greats. Alta posted a total team time of 80:20 over the heralded course designed in part by Utah coaching legend Ben Stowell in 1998. The new Utah State Championship course has been the standard of excellence for dominant teams looking for National recognition.
In 1998, the inaugural course was unveiled. In that year, Mountain View posted a team time of 81:15 going on to being crowned National Champions. The following year Mountain View produced one of the most dominant teams in National history setting the State Championship team time record at 80:24. That time would stand untouched for nearly 10 years. In that year, Mountain View finished as National Champions. Before the 2008 season Mountain View had held the top five overall team times in State course history. Three of those teams went on to be crowned National Champions with two others competing at NTN Nationals; both finishing ranked #5 Nationally.
Utah State Championships Course Map (courtesy UHSTCA Vice President Timo Mostert)
Boys New State Course (1998- )Top Team Times (5 runner cumulative)
80:20 Alta 5A-1 2008
80:24 Mountain View 5A-1 1999 *National Champions/#2 in some polls
80:35 Timpview 4A-1 2008
80:36 Mountain View 4A-1 2002 *National Champions
81:15 Mountain View 5A-1 1998 *National Champions
81:17 Mountain View 5A-1 2005 *#5 NTN National Championships
81:22 American Fork 5A-2 2008
81:22 Mountain View 4A-1 2004 *#5 NTN National Championships
We asked Alta Coach Murphy his thoughts regarding the 2008 Alta team, their goals, and what has inspired him most about this team.
MilesplitUT- Please talk about your own personal track and XC
background, from your first involvement to your getting into coaching
Coach Murphy: I ran track and cross country at Dunedin High School in Dunedin, Florida. I ran for three years – not very impressively – at Furman University in Greenville, S.C. I’ve remained a fairly competitive runner ever since and still run an occasional 35 minute 10k and sub 3 hour marathon.
MilesplitUT- In 2006 your team placed 7th at State, in 2007 your team placed 5th at State, finally, culminating in a 5A State Championship in 2008. What has the ride been like, it is clear you are building a program that is improving each year, what is Alta doing that has caused such amazing success?
Coach Murphy: The state championship was the big goal for us this year. Alta High School has won, I believe, 45 state championships over the years, but none until this year in boys cross country. It means a lot to me and the guys to be part of this tradition now. Also, to be mentioned alongside the Mountain View, Davis, and Bingham teams of the past is quite an honor. I think our main challenge is the challenge most programs face, that is, attracting a large group of guys to the sport with the right attitude. If you get 100 guys out for cross country, chances are 5 of them can run. If only 10 come out you’re just lucky to find five to compete at a top level.
MilesplitUT- When did you know you had a special team this year? Who is your top runner, with such depth it seems your top five would each be individual race favorites, what has it been like to have a team so dominant week in and week out?
Coach Murphy- Well, four of our current runners – Kyle Moffet, Garrett Jones, Parker Syndergaard, and Jack Webster – have been with us for the past three or four years. Each one was a varsity runner as a Freshman. Their success has mostly been due to consistent hard work over a period of years. We’ve had our ups and downs. I think I may have placed a little too much pressure on them when they were younger. I really think our success this year has been the product of a lot of hard work and some humbling learning experiences.
MilesplitUT- What are some of the training principles that are the cornerstone of the Alta program? Off-season/base training? Mileage at different points of the season? Particular favorite workouts?
Coach Murphy- I’ve learned a lot from trial and error over the years. I have notebooks full of workouts that don’t work. I try to take the principles of all the great coaches – Lydiard, Daniels, Bowerman – and try and apply them to the time constraints and realities of high school coaching. I’m pretty proud of our summer program and I think it’s the main reason for our success. For our veteran runners, it looks like this…
Monday – we do a 6.5 mile run we call the “gully long run”. It’s mostly sand and wood chip with a killer 800 meter hill at about half-way. We do it as a hard tempo run. Kyle Moffet is the master of this workout and holds the record at 39:15.
Tuesday – We meet at the sight of our region meet course and do a short recovery run plus some drills, push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. Later in the summer we do mile repeats on this day.
Wednesday – We meet at Sugarhouse Park, the site of our state meet. This is usually a hilly 8-10 miles.
Thursday – We meet at Alta Ski Area for a 10 mile run at altitude. Starting at about 8500 feet and going up to about 10000. This is the favorite run of the week for most of the guys.
Friday – We don’t meet as a team, but this is a 4 to 6 mile recovery run
Saturday – Road race or long run. Long run is 12 miles by the end of the summer.
Sunday – Rest
MilesplitUT- Utah has never seen a spread of top runners over the state course that you produced, you had five runners average 16 minutes over the 5K course, with this in mind, what are your expectations and goals heading into NXN Southwest region Championship next week? How eager is your team to line up with US#2 Albuquerque, NM?
Coach Murphy- We are eager to match up against those teams. We also realize that American Fork and Timpview are certainly capable of beating us. We would love to qualify to go to Portland. It’s been great winning big invitationals like Murray and Orem-Kiwanis by wide margins. I think that’s when we realized we were on track for something special this year. For a long time it didn’t look like we would have a true #1 runner. Kyle Moffet, Jack Webster, and Garrett Jones each have run in that position this year. However, Garrett has emerged as a true #1 the last few weeks and is looking really strong in workouts. Working with these guys has been the highlight of my coaching career. They are a joy to coach – disciplined, smart, experienced.
Teams collide on November 22 at the Nike Cross Southwest Championships in Tempe, AZ where teams will compete for a berth to Nike Cross Nationals Team Championship competing on the famed NXN course in Portland, Meadows. What we know is that Utah teams race well at NXN. Alta looks to add to an impressive season as the they travel to face nationally ranked #4 Albuquerque NM, Nat #15 Los Alamos NM, and Nat #21 Cibola NM.