HOW long should a college track coach get to keep their job without winning anything?

But the lack of priority on winning usually exists with a school's administration and/or athletic department, not with the coaches.

Inquired wrote:

I'd say 5 years is enough. If they don't win their conference meet in 5 years they should be gone. That way more people get opportunity to coach and show what they can do. There isn't enough of a priority on winning in this sport.

Is this a 5 team conference?

In all seriousness, there are lots of factors that should play in.

1. Has there been steady improvement?

2. How much interest has the coach generated?

3. *How many students has the coach brought in that otherwise wouldn't have come to the university?*

With the facilities and resources (or lack thereof) that a lot of head coaches have, winning a competitive conference meet is not a realistic expectation. In 5 years, even if you are an awesome coach, recruits are just now getting to see how well you develop talent, anyway.

How long should a runner be allowed to keep their scholarship without winning anything? I'd say 5 months is enough...

HRE wrote:

But the lack of priority on winning usually exists with a school's administration and/or athletic department, not with the coaches.

That's the point. There needs to be a change by ADs. Hold coaches accountable.

How long do you want to give a coach? Ten years? Twenty? Thirty?

The point of competitive sports is to win. When coaches are hired you never hear them say that they don't expect to win anything. I don't ever remember a coach when they were hired saying we're not going to win anything for the next 20 years . Rather. they always talk about turning a program around. Or, continuing success. Whichever is relevant. So if they fail at it should they get to keep their job? They knew what the stakes were when they took the job, they know what the resources were, they knew what they had to deal with, and yet they still say they want to turn a program around. There are far too many dinosaurs in track programs who have been allowed to lose for years. It's a problem.

Inquired wrote:

thejeff wrote:

Is this a 5 team conference?

In all seriousness, there are lots of factors that should play in.

1. Has there been steady improvement?

2. How much interest has the coach generated?

3. *How many students has the coach brought in that otherwise wouldn't have come to the university?*

With the facilities and resources (or lack thereof) that a lot of head coaches have, winning a competitive conference meet is not a realistic expectation. In 5 years, even if you are an awesome coach, recruits are just now getting to see how well you develop talent, anyway.

How long should a runner be allowed to keep their scholarship without winning anything? I'd say 5 months is enough...

How long do you want to give a coach? Ten years? Twenty? Thirty?

How long do I want to give a coach to do what? Win a conference championship? Championships are a by-product of good programs, not a cause of them. If I have a coach who is consistently competitive, his athletes graduate and keep their noses clean, and he has a good rapport with the alumni, then I would keep him for 50 years if I could.

In the real world, there are more important things than championships. Trophies gather dust.

In it to win wrote:

The point of competitive sports is to win. When coaches are hired you never hear them say that they don't expect to win anything. I don't ever remember a coach when they were hired saying we're not going to win anything for the next 20 years . Rather. they always talk about turning a program around. Or, continuing success. Whichever is relevant. So if they fail at it should they get to keep their job? They knew what the stakes were when they took the job, they know what the resources were, they knew what they had to deal with, and yet they still say they want to turn a program around. There are far too many dinosaurs in track programs who have been allowed to lose for years. It's a problem.

The best coaches I have ever played for, coached with, or been around, do not emphasize winning. They emphasize the details of doing your job correctly...self discipline. The winning comes on its own.

Their whole career. Track isn't a real sport like football and basketball. No AD ever lost a job because the track coach sucked.

Everyone in this thread who does not put first priority on winning should get out of sports. All that intrinsic stuff can also exist within a winning program, not just ones who finish middle of the pack or bottom of the barrel. This thread is proof of the mislead direction of our sport when there isn't 100 % of concensus that winning is the most important

In a professional setting I * might* agree with you, but even there professional sports are about entertainment. If a coach were to consistently put an entertaining product on the field, measured by the satisfaction of paying spectators, I would probably hold onto that coach.

In a collegiate setting, there are many goals for a program. A win-at-all-costs approach is unlikely to be consistent with the mission of any university. Any coach or athlete that emphasizes outcome over process isn't likely to have success in the long run in terms of wins/losses and is very likely to be out of a job quickly as few self-respecting athletes would want to run for a coach like that.. Do the right things over-and-over and the wins will come.

Even at his prime, Tiger Woods didn't win every tournament. Would you really have told him to change coaches after he lost 5 tournaments or 5 majors in a row? Ridiculous.

There are many excellent criteria by which to judge a coach. Eliminating all of them except winning is just foolish.

"Do the right things over and over and wins come"

What if they dont?

Yes programs do more than wjatvhappens on scoreboards, but you should have all that whether you win or not -experiences, get a degree, mentoring et al. But if they don't win it's time to go. This isn't win at all costs. But winning is what separates. Track coaches have indoor and out to win every year. Men and women in combined programs. If you coach ten years that's 20 chances to win for men, and 20 for women. 40 chances. You think if they fail to win any in ten years that's not grounds to fire

? Sniveling little coddled track geeks make me sick when they can't face results, and want a salary for participation. Get the fk out of sports. Go join a knitting club.

Winning is not everything, it's the only thing.

-Vince Lombardi

In the real world, there are more important things than championships. Trophies gather dust.[/quote]

You are Sickening

I basically agree with those who think winning is important. I do, too, because I think it's the best reinforcement for the kind of lessons we're trying to teach through athletics.

As one data point, in response to the thread title's question: at my last coaching job, I spent 14 years without ever winning a conference meet. I finally left on my own, without being asked to do so--primarily because I was sick of not giving my athletes the winning experience (aka education) that they deserved.

Inquired wrote:

I'd say 5 years is enough. If they don't win their conference meet in 5 years they should be gone. That way more people get opportunity to coach and show what they can do. There isn't enough of a priority on winning in this sport.

No way. I think a coach should be allowed to go their entire career without winning anything depending on the school and circumstances. Even though conferences try to keep schools within that conference competitive with each other, it can be pretty lopsided sometimes, especially in certain sports. Some schools are just not attractive schools or don't have the resources. In such cases, a coach who is able to have his team(s) finish mid pack or near the top is doing fine.

I was the victim of some pretty bad coaching in college, but even I think coaches are too quickly disposed of a lot of the time. In my experience and observation, crappy coaches who are let go are generally replaced with coaches who are just as bad or only marginally better. I've seen guys' lives turned upside down just so the university can try something new for awhile, even if though the new coach was even worse than the last... Unfortunately there seems to be a horrible disconnect between the AD and the coaches at a lot of schools, especially in the realm of TandF and XC. In my exit interview, one of the higher ups I gave the interview with didn't even know some of the basic events of T&F or how meets were scored... I don't expect them to understand the physiological bases of lactate threshold and VO2 max, but at least understanding the rules of each sport they're overseeing might be a good idea. They fired the head XC coach that year.

Winning is hard, but should a team should be competing for a conference title within 5 years.

Pepto wrote:

In the real world, there are more important things than championships. Trophies gather dust.

You are Sickening[/quote]

Nope, I am Jeff.

I also happen to be right. Don't get me wrong, I think participation trophies are the worst thing that have happened to our society since the Ace of Base. But instilling a competitive mindset, teaching fundamentals, and reinforcing sportsmanship and self worth are the proper goals a coach should have. Winning is a happy by-product.

I will grant you that winning becomes more important if you are coaching professional athletes.

Should every coach who lost to John Mcdonnel have neen fired? Do you expect Oregon State, Cal and some others win the Pac? Not allschools have the resources to compete against powerhouse schools in our sport. Winning an eventor two or just getting some points might be all one can hope for.

I would agree that some coaches are allowed to be mediocre and in some cases they've been allowed to stay because no one cares. I will say however that winning in the general sense isn't something that can be graded equally across every campus. Schools have different resources, more or less money, better or worse facilities, more or less attractive campuses. And so on......So to assume that EVERY coach should be given the same time frame to "win" is shortsighted and plain foolish.

Ex. I coach at a small D1 school with the bare minimum in terms of money and resources. Our team is small and our facilites can barely accommodate the numbers we do have. The indoor track (if you can call it that) has been the source of many visits to the training room and our outdoor track gets used for a total of 3-4 months throughout the track season due to our weather.

We literally can't compete in certain events because we dont have the facilities both indoor and outdoor. Getting athletes to come to the school is tough, but we've gotten the most out of the few we've had. In the events that we have competitors in, we generally perform well and in most cases better than the competition. But if you only have 14-16 athletes, your chances of ever winning even if you won every event you competed in are slim to none.

Does that situation improve by getting rid of the coaches....?