The Panthers are currently on their down week after four strong weeks of hard practice.

This is part of a concept known as peaking, which means balancing volume, intensity and effort in order to be at your best fitness level by a certain point in the season, head cross country coach Geoff Masanet said.

“The time we are really going to be peaking is right before conference and regionals at the end of the season,” Masanet said. “That is when we want to be at our best but right now, the lighter week is just because of how this week fits into the pattern of the entire season.”

After this lighter week, Masanet said they will go hard for two weeks, have one lighter week, then two more hard weeks and one lighter again.

Masanet said the summer is probably the most intense part for the runners, or at least it should be when they are putting in a lot of miles and training hard.

Senior Brad Butler said this light week will probably help a lot because it leads into the Panther Invitational, which is the big home meet of the season, and doing well at home is important to many of the athletes.

“After running hard everyday for so many days, the break is just going to help our muscles a little going into the Panther Invite and then Invite after Invite for the rest of the season,” freshman Nic Kuczwara said.

A light week is more about resting and bringing down the amount of miles you are normally running but maybe running a little quicker, Masanet said.

“It’s about taking care of yourself so you are ready when you need to be,” junior Katie O’Brien said. “It’s lighter mileage, and the workouts just aren’t as hard. Some people will even get a day off at the end of the week because of how hard they’ve worked on their miles.”

After running hard for over a month, the runners can feel the difference on an easy week.

“The lighter practices make your legs feel a little better and gives you a little more spring and freshness,” Butler said.

Butler said he has been running about 80 to 85 miles a week but this week he will cut back to 70 miles.

On a light week a runner normally runs about 10 to 15 miles less than what they run on the hard weeks but it really depends on each individual runner, Butler said.

“Everyone is really tired right now, and this is when we are supposed to be tired so we are doing good but we need to make sure we take this down week and use it to our advantage so that next week we are ready to go hard again,” sophomore Erin O’Grady said.