The Cross Country team not only has new team members but new coaches too. And with new coaches come new strategies and goals.

English teacher, Nicole Nolting, joined coach Derek Higa on the Boys and Girls Cross-Country team. Nolting has a goal she wants her team to achieve. She wants to make it a team sport instead of an individual sport.

"My strategies on achieving this goal are to have runners support each other and have the faster team members help the slower team members, and at races continually support each other," Nolting said.

She puts her strategies to the test at practice by doing workouts that require working in pairs or groups.

In Cross Country for his second time, Senior Rocky Paredes feels the new strategies are a big help.

"It helps by knowing how to work in a team because it would help in the real world and we learn how to help each other," Paredes said.

There are certain requirements to be a coach for any OIA team. "I select teachers first and if there?s no one then we post a notice. They need to have background information on the sport they want to coach and it would be good if they had a coach certification," Tokunaga said.

Nolting participated in Cross Country and Track in high school and college. She also coached middle school Track and Field.