Big River Feature Interview: Rikki Watts

Fort Zumwalt South sophomore Rikki Watts is continuing the great runnign tradition that the Bulldogs have established over the last few years. Consistently placing very high at all the big invitationals this year she is in position to have a great end-of-the-season run. Big River caught up with Rikki after the Hancock Invitational where she place eighth in the Class 4 division. The following article can also be read at www.stlscoop.com and found in the October issue, St. Charles Edition, of St. Louis Scoop Magazine.

---The beginning of the cross country season starts with a string of big meets every weekend throughout September. In Saint Louis the biggest meets, in succession, are the First Capitol Invitational, the Forest Park Cross Country Festival, the Paul Enke Invitational and the Hancock Invitational. To finish near the front at each of those meets is a huge accomplishment for any athlete. The feat is even more amazing if it is pulled off by a sophomore, and more amazing still if that sophomore spent half the summer battling pneumonia.. ....................................................photo by Katie Sutton

Fort Zumwalt South's Rikki Watts has had an outstanding four weeks indeed. She was 18th at First Capitol, 15th at Forest Park, seventh at Paul Enke and eighth Hancock. A very timid young lady when you talk to her, she has done it all with a sort of attitude that seems to fit perfectly for distance running.

“Before the race I'm pretty nervous,” Watts said. “It kind of just goes away when the gun goes off though.”

It must go away because to finish that high amongst that type of top-notch competition takes an intensely focused mind. For Watts , that focus is honed in practice where her and her Fort Zumwalt South teammates work as hard as anyone out there.

“We do weights in the morning, we do long runs and we'll do mile repeats,” Watts said. “Mile repeats are the hardest and we'll do four to five of them.”

For the non-cross country aficionados mile repeats are a staple of the sport for any high school or college team across the country. Everyone has done them and they always hurt. A runner will run a mile at the same pace she races at or faster, take a brief rest of three to five minutes, and then do it again and again and again.

Watts said that it will be workouts like these that help her accomplish her goals this season.

“I just want to make it to State and I want our team to make it too,” Watts said. “I just have to keep working hard at practice.”

The man giving Watts all of these tough workouts is Coach Greg Hallam. Hallam said that Watts may be a little shy in her demeanor but that she does not shy away from hard work.

“She's here every Tuesday and Thursday morning lifting weights and doing step-ups,” Hallam said. “She's a very quiet hard worker.”

Watts was quick to point out the advantages that her new coach has brought to the team.

“[Coach Hallam] is a lot of fun and he's done a really good job,” Watts said.

One thing that Hallam tried to impress upon Watts is the need to get out a little bit faster.

“I think sometimes because she is so shy she will go out a little slower,” Hallam said. “We've noticed that she'll start out in the 30s and then move up into 18th by the mile and then finish seven, eight or nine.”

Like the obedient runner that she is, Watts listened to her coach at the Hancock Invitational and got out fast, maybe too fast. She was in first place at the top of the first hill.

“She ended up running about the same time she had been running,” Hallam said.

Perhaps Watts is just a natural. After all, we are talking about a runner who was curled up in bed with pneumonia early in the summer.

Watts said she got sick in early June and wasn't able to begin training until just before practice started in August. Compare that to many of her competitors who started a strict training regimen in June and ran all summer long to build up their endurance for the season.

Hallam said that everyone has been pleasantly surprised with Watt's quick return.

“When the season started she was just hoping to be a varsity runner,” Hallam said. “Of course now she's our number one runner.”

She would be the number one runner on most teams in the area which makes one start to wonder about where she might end up finishing at the State Meet. Even though the humble Watts said her goal was just to make it to State. Hallam said he thinks Watts can still drop about 45 seconds off of her best time.

“I think she's going to be about 19:30 or so,” Hallam said. “Once we start backing down the repeats and going faster she'll see her times drop.”

One thing Watts has going for her is that she is training in a system that has worked for more than 20 years. Hallam bases his workouts after the same system used by famed cross country coach Paul Enke. Enke led the Fort Zumwalt South boys to back-to-back State championships in 2005 and 2006. He also coached some great teams at Hazelwood Central in the 1980s and one of the best individuals in Missouri history, Meghan Thompson.

Hallam said that, just like in Enke's system, Watts and her teammates started with repeats that were a mile and a quarter, then they went down to miles, then 1200s, and as they come down the stretch they will run one kilometer repeats and finally half miles. The pace will get faster as the repeats get shorter and that will hopefully give Watts the speed she needs to run that 19:30 .

One thing is for sure, Rikki Watts will do the workouts, she won't complain and she will run her heart out on Saturday mornings.

Support the Store that Supports the Sport!