Tips for Coaching Rich Kids?

No cut team? Therein lies your problem. If the entitled brats don't care, let them warm the bench. Focus on those who want to run. The entitled idiots will quit anyway.

Devastator wrote:

No cut team? Therein lies your problem. If the entitled brats don't care, let them warm the bench. Focus on those who want to run. The entitled idiots will quit anyway.

^^This.

work or walk

Have the team meet and set their own goals. Being able to say "you've said that you want to win districts this year, so I've tailored your training to your goal" is way more effective than saying "do this workout because I'm the coach and I said so."

Lower-income kids are used to a world where authority figures simply tell them what to do. Upper class kids are used to working in partnership with the adults in their lives to accomplish mutually agreed upon ends. Give them some ownership and you'll see them respond.

sluffin it wrote:

Devastator wrote:

No cut team? Therein lies your problem. If the entitled brats don't care, let them warm the bench. Focus on those who want to run. The entitled idiots will quit anyway.

^^This.

work or walk

Looks like the walking part is all too true.

Set goals and establish rewards and recognition that they can't buy.

You're in a tough situation and you're doing everything right. Mommy and daddy are happy that Brett and Buffy are athletes and can put that down on their college application. Brett and Buffy want to go through the motions and spend 2 additional hours away from home. Remember these parents can raise money for your program.

Spend your energy on the kids who care, let the kids know this and continue to try to raise the quality. Again you're doing everything right but are handcuffed.

You can not force kids to try or run.

Make the practices a living hell for them and they might quit.

Give them a drill or exercise to do or even a definitive start time for practice. If they don't do the drill or are late tell them their practice is done and send them home.

Set a rule if you miss more than a certain number of practices they don't race.

We have a no cut rule too but if you miss 3 practises you are not racing for 2 meets. If you are more than 5 minutes late for a practice you don't practice and it counts as a missed practice.

The kids and parents are all given the rules at the start of the season as part of the parent permission document so the rules are known.

Every year I lose about 10 kids which is fine. Interestingly I often lose the best natural runner because they have a bad attitude and think they can goof off or be late.

Good luck

Rich kids, despite mommy and daddy being able to afford to send them to any college in the nation, desire nothing more than a D1 scholarship. Anytime tthey goof or slack off just hint they aren't putting in the work to be a D1 runner and they'll buckle down. For a rich kid, there is nothing worse than being a walk on, nothing. Or even worse, running D3. D3 is so unthinkable that any rich kid who thinks he may end up there is sure to take his adidas boost clad feet for a "highest mileage ever" summer. Schools are unfortunately bad at teaching math these days though so 40 is considered a "high number" and 40 mpw is considered "high mileage". You'll be constantly working to get your kids to run more. If you have any alum running for a d1 college have them come talk to the team in the summer. Only a concrete example that you need more than 40 mpw will get kids to run more.

Along with this, getting in the idea that 50 mpw isnt even high, show them what really good runners run. Best runners don't think in terms of high mileage, they just do what they need to do, they know that 60 mpw isnt high. Give them perspective

6 guys under 4:40 is pretty solid for a high school tho, are the top guys entitled?

mostly agree with Coach (registered) above... focus on the kids who you see want to be good (regardless of talent level). those who give the effort as opposed to the kids who are either out there because their parents are forcing them or because they think they need it for their resume. some of the kids who show no interest will come around because they see your passion and genuine interest in helping the other kids improve. a few will quit, which is awesome, and the others will just go through the motions but you won't care because you are focusing your time and energy on the kids who are committed and interested.

try not to get frustrated with the kid who you know has real talent but simply doesn't care enough to follow your lead, they exist everywhere in the world. as i said above, sometimes it clicks in their brains, remember they are just teenagers so they haven't the experience you have. Keep after it and your program will build...

I like the goal setting idea. Also have them set expectations of what it takes to be on the team. Have them set expectations of you.

I am not a fan of the idea of making practices so hard you run kids off. Really, you people think this is a way to grow the sport and develop lifelong fans?

Train each kid according to his/her ability. As for the A skip, well if they have never done it before then it is your job to teach them! Someone taught you.

Yes, some of those kids are in XC to get ready for winter sports. At my HS you had to take PE (which was after school from 3-4:30 or be in a co-curricular activity or sport each term. So we had kids who would run to get ready for a winter or spring sport. Each year we would find a kid that learned that XC (and maybe track) were really good sports for them. I was one of those kids. Cultivate them. We had a solid runner who only ran XC to get ready for basketball and baseball. He was a major scorer for us at every meet. If you are at a small school, then you cannot afford to run off kids.

Also, have a parents meeting. Give them an overview of the program. Have parents and kids sign a "contract". The first item should be "If my kid has a problem with the coach, the kid should meet with the coach first before going to mom/dad or the AD" (Okay there would be some exceptions here for abuse and such, but you get the idea).

I think of a coach in youth and high school sports as someone to develop athletes and instill lessons. I suggest checking out the materials at the Positive Coaching Alliance. Lots of good resources there.

I know nothing about coaching and won't pretend otherwise. But I'm impressed at how thoughtful and sensible the replies on this thread are. (Compared to most of this message board, that is.) I guess lots of folks on this board really do care about kids, however much grief they may like to give each other.

Just remember for rich kids and their parents, getting fitted for a prom tux is reason enough to miss practice OR a meet.

Devastator wrote:

No cut team? Therein lies your problem. If the entitled brats don't care, let them warm the bench. Focus on those who want to run. The entitled idiots will quit anyway.

Cross Country teams are usually no cut teams. Who would enter that if they could be cut?

How do you define "rich"?

Find out which school has the kids who / whose parents do their landscaping, work in restaurants or wash cars. Set up a meet. I can almost picture it.

How do you define "rich"?

Find out which school has the kids who / whose parents do their landscaping, work in restaurants or wash cars. Set up a meet. I can almost picture it.

Way after high school and college had ended, a bunch of us from my high school team got together to run while we were all home for thanksgiving. Just a group of 5-6 of us, nothing crazy, kind of last minute, a good old run around the old xc course and our small town. We happened to see our high school coach out while we were running (again, small town), he stopped us and said, "it makes me so happy to see you all out here, still running. Makes me feel like I did something right."

That moment my entire perspective on my coaching changed. I had been trying to do everything I could to get 5 fast guys to the line in November to win things. I realized that if you really want a successful team, you need people who are friends, work together, support each other, and care about running for running- not for fast times, championships, qualifications, etc. After I changed MY attitude about it, my team changed too. They ended up qualifying for the state meet for the first time ever, only 5 years after the program began. Some ran D1, some ran college club teams, 3 ran marathons after graduating college. When I see them still running, it makes me happy.

I'm not sure why people are acting like having rich kids is some kind of challenge. High school distance running is dominated by wealthy suburban schools.

Create a "Team Within a Team." Who says everyone gets the same workouts, goes to the same meets? You can even get different uniforms for top kids. No cuts? No problem.

Wealthy kids (and parents) understand status. Nothing makes kids and parents want better results more than when they think they (their kids) are on the outside of the "A" team. If they don't care, problem solved, let them stretch and run an easy 4 miles a day, go to duel meets against South Northville Tri-County HS and get most improved Senior year.