Next year I'm going to be a senior, and as a senior I want to run my best. My coach is competitive but never really gave us much direction in the summer practices (the senior captains hold practice by themselves throughout the summer until the last 2-3 weeks of august, when the actual coach will be present). Our team is absent of seniors (we live in a small town) except my friend and I, so I have no one to talk about in terms of practice strategy.
We've never had any direction in how far or what to even do but long runs during the summer, and now I've been reading that we should be doing strides, speed days, a certain mileage a week, ect. I would really just want some direction on how to be the best I possibly can for my last year of xc, thanks!