![]() ![]() Pac-Five runner Annie Kawasaki practices with the That means the runners will have to train on grass during the week and adjust to the rubberized surface at Punahou for Saturday's Interscholastic League on Honolulu meet, with precious little preparation time. "And I thought the park would be the place." "We were kind of stuck and I thought, 'Where can I get our kids to practice in a place everyone pretty much knows and would feel comfortable with their kids being at?' " Wilson said. And while Stoneman Field at Schofield Barracks is available, the team doesn't have the buses to transport 70 varsity, junior varsity and intermediate athletes to Wahiawa every day. The team worked out at Mid-Pacific Institute's field several years ago when the UH football team reserved Cooke Field for spring drills, but Wilson felt the field was too cramped. Wilson and his staff considered practicing on the tracks at Punahou and Iolani, but the heavy use of those facilities snuffed those possibilities. But when strikes involving the UH Professional Assembly and the Hawaii State Teachers' Association started last week, the Wolfpack were shut out of both locations. The team then moved its Monday, Wednesday and Friday workouts to Kaimuki's dirt track. ![]() But when UH started its women's track and field program this year, the Wolfpack's time was cut to Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. In past years, Pac-Five used Cooke Field for its practices. The Wolfpack's practice sessions at the Diamond Head end of the park opened Monday with orange cones marking running lanes, sprinters performing drills around coconut trees and long jumpers working out in the sand of San Souci beach just across the street. "We just have to improvise," said Pac-Five head coach Al Wilson. But with strikers blocking access to both sites, the team must now set up shop at Kapiolani Park. The squad, made up of student-athletes from 13 private schools, had been practicing at Cooke Field on the University of Hawaii campus and the Kaimuki High School track. The dual strikes that have paralyzed Hawaii's public education system have also turned Pac-Five into a team on the run. But these days the team may as well be called the Nomads. Officially, the nickname of the Pac-Five track and field team is the Wolfpack. ![]() Holds workouts at Kapiolani Park because strikers block access Pac-Five runners took off during practice yesterday. ![]()
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