The start of a new season means different things for different people. Athletes spend time preparing to have a successful start in many different ways. For OH girls’ track and field, girls spend their off-season going on frequent runs and doing strength training.
Many athletes have been with their teams for their whole high school careers. OH junior Kristin Soderlind said, “I’ve grown a lot with the girls, and we have really close relationships.”
For many athletes, there is more to the sport than just winning. OH track and field assistant coach Alicia Rafferty said, “We want to make the girls who come into our program from wherever they came from.. We want them to gain courage in racing, but ultimately, we also want it to be a family.”
Many athletes not only need to physically prepare themselves for the season but also mentally. OH junior Morgan Bradley said that the biggest challenge with OH track is “Definitely the mental battles, the team does not always put their full foot forward.”
OH track is all about community and building relationships, and having a positive culture. Rafferty explained that, “We go off what’s called the Valkyrie symbol, it represents many attributes, in particular courage, fearlessness, physical strength, and the empowerment of women.”
With the support of the coaching staff, OH track has seen a successful last few seasons. Soderlind explained that, “During my freshman year, I believe, the head coach quit midway through the season, so we had to combine with the boys, so we didn’t really have a stable program, but we were able to still work hard and be successful.”
Since facing the struggle with the coaching staff, OH track has really made an effort to change the culture of the program, Soderlind said, “My greatest accomplishment is probably redefining the culture… when I originally got there, there was a lot of messy stuff with the coaching staff, and I feel like we’ve really worked through it.”
With this change in coaching staff, the team still continued to be positive and work through the obstacles thrown at them, and turned the program around. Raffery explained, “That’s what our new head coach said, this year he really wants this program to be like a family.” The family perspective of the team has been successful, as Bradley said that the culture of the team was, “Very great, especially the distance squad, we are all super close friends.”
The season kicked off with a home meet on Feb. 19 2026, securing a win for OH.
Hi! My name is Ainslee Gerardot and I'm a junior at Oswego High School. This is my first year of the 42Fifty staff, and I am proud to serve as Social Media Editor. You can contact me by emailing 42Fifty@sd308.org and putting my name in the subject line. We welcome comments on our articles and feedback on our publication!
