I've got a kid who loves the long run.

No experience, but my thoughts are:

1.) Next year, have a rule that your athletes can only do one sport at a time

2.) Tell this particular kid that you notice he's doing great with his running and you think he can handle more training. He'll (hopefully) be flattered by the attention. I suggest you increase his mileage target to 40, and give the following guidelines: no runs less than 4 miles, no runs longer than 15 miles. Running super slowly isn't ideal, but if he builds up his mileage, it's not the end of the world.

Conventional thinking is that the long run should be between 20 to 25% of the total weekly mileage. If you subscribe to that way of thinking, you are way off (i.e. the 'long run' is way too long).

Some would say that 30 miles a week is too little for the above 'rule' to apply. (i.e. that you shouldn't even be worrying about a long run until the weekly mileage is more like 40 miles.

In addition, some would say a 2 mile run is a waste of time, and they'd likely say the same of a 3 mile run (depending on the context of course . A 3 mile shakeout the morning of an afternoon workout might make sense, but a 3 mile run as the run of the day probably accomplishes little.

I would say, if he feels compelled to run with his friends, have him keep going when they stop or have him start before and link up with him mid-run, after he has already put in a couple of miles.

I would also aim to hit 30 (if that is the weekly goal) through some combination of 4 to 7 mile runs. I also think 5 days a week is not asking too much, but it sounds like this kid is not even sure that he is a runner, so that might be pushing it.

Summary: 14 mile long run in a 30 mile week is like trying to learn 500 SAT words in the week before the test instead of trying to spread out learning the 500 words over one or two months.

Let him go as long as he wants every two weeks, but limit his runs to under 7 miles otherwise. Keep it fun but be a real coach and give him guidance.

YMMV wrote:

Keep it fun but be a real coach and give him guidance.

That’s the thing. Part of coaching is helping kids develop self determination. If I’m overly prescriptive, I’m taking some of his initiative away. If I’m not prescribing enough, I’m allowing him to waste his time.

I’m thinking of a quote that says something to the effect that the best way to get a ship built is to teach the men to yearn for the vast and endless sea.

CoachB wrote:

YMMV wrote:

Keep it fun but be a real coach and give him guidance.

That’s the thing. Part of coaching is helping kids develop self determination. If I’m overly prescriptive, I’m taking some of his initiative away. If I’m not prescribing enough, I’m allowing him to waste his time.

I’m thinking of a quote that says something to the effect that the best way to get a ship built is to teach the men to yearn for the vast and endless sea.

I agree with this train of thought completely. Teach them to love the sport first, and they'll be willing to tackle whatever training you want later. Some kids (especially younger runners) really need that social time to stay happy. We tend to let them control the pace on easy runs early during the offseason, and coaches gradually take more control of it during the season. We try to find a balance of giving the kids options and making sure they are making smart training choices. Our winter has looked something like this (for reference we had a long XC season this year and don't run indoor):

Week 1 - Run 5 days, 25-30 min. a day.

Week 2 - Run 6 days, 25 - 40 min a day

Week 3 - Run 6 days, 6 mi. long run, 30-40 min a day

Week 4 - Run 6 days, 7 mi. long run, 1 fartlek, 30-40 min a day for the rest

I think with your athlete, it's fine to let him run with friends, but maybe give him a more specific long run goal. If he's doing 30 mpw right now (with a lot of it low intensity), and loves the long run, a long run of 7-9 miles could work for him. I think a slow pace on his easy days is fine at this point in his career. I've had plenty of high level varsity athletes that have run easy days with kids significantly slower than them, especially if the varsity kid is a freshman whose peers are running lower levels.

I think I will suggest that he ups his mileage to 40 and caps his long run at 10. I think I'll also have one of the varsity kids grab him and pull him along on one or two runs per week.

The kid will, hopefully, be flattered on both accounts.

Lydiard told me that he thought the best thing to do with kids that age is to try to get them interested in seeing how far they can run rather than how fast. And he also used to say that you can never run too slowly but you can run too fast. It wouldn't hurt if his other runs got a bit longer.

I'm helping guide a few kids over the winter to help build their base. I'm not sure your runner's runs are very good. If he is enjoying himself that is all that really matters. I'd say a more balanced approach would be better.

I have always thought if a run is under a half hour it is really not doing much. My kids are doing 30-35 miles for 5 days M-F. I suggest they run on the weekends.

Here are some sample runs. They get to pick what they do but no repeats in a week. Each week the runs go up by .5 miles.

E=Easy runs

5-7 miles

5.5 miles w 7-10 strides at 85% max speed

6.5 miles w 5-6 strides at 90%

7.5 miles 5-6 strides at 85%-95%

M=Medium runs

7-8 miles, hill loop 1 mile with a 30 & 35 foot hill. uphill medium down very easy

6 mile fartlek 3min at 5k pace +20-30 seconds 1 minute easy

7 mile progression run.

7miles 2 mile warm-up 3 miles of 200/100s on the track at 2 mile pace. 1 mile cool down

7 miles 2 mile warm-up 4-5x1000 @ 3 mile pace +20 seconds 2 mile cool down

Mon-M, Tue-E, Wed-E, Thur-M, Fri-E

Conventional thinking is wrong in many respects, including this.

As soon as this kid gets some goal orientation aside from volume, he'll be fine. The sooner he has a five mile loop and he starts paying attention to pace, he'll progress quickly.

Just remind him there are no long races in HS.

And cap his running long run at 8mi until he can run those miles in < 1 hour .

What's the chance that this kid is completely BS-ing you?

It's definitely possible from how you describe him--an unfocused kid, who isn't even sure he wants to be a runner and who seems to spend most of his runs with slower friends to socialize.

"1.) Next year, have a rule that your athletes can only do one sport at a time"

Here's a thought. How about not making up rules that benefit you and not the student?

And don't come back with "concentrating on one sport will benefit the student". Life is way more complicated than that.

I had a kid like this, loved talking about how he ran 12+ mile long runs when I told them to do 8. Just because you can run long DOES NOT mean you can run fast, ex = ultra runners. Have him focus on slowly increasing the long run AT A DECENT PACE. My kid would run around 9min pace, couldn’t break 22min in 5k. Put an upper limit on pace so he isn’t walk jogging 14 Miles.

FriendlyLobo wrote:

What's the chance that this kid is completely BS-ing you?

It's definitely possible from how you describe him--an unfocused kid, who isn't even sure he wants to be a runner and who seems to spend most of his runs with slower friends to socialize.

I didn't mean to imply that he was unfocused. He is a Freshman who needs enough guidance to direct his focus into making him a good runner but not so much that it squashes his own self determination. I mean, the kids did a full cross country practice, went home for an hour, then came back for a full football practice. He was exhausted by the end of September. I have a feeling that if I would have forced the issue with football during the fall, he would have chosen cross, but the freshman football coaches asked me not to force the issue (and since they only had 16 kids on the team, I decided not to). I've already told him that next year he's going to need to make a choice between sports. He was our #1 JV runner and I think he could be a nice asset to the varsity team next year, but I can't have him only giving 75% in meets because he's so tired.

As far as this off season training goes, many of the kids that he ran with during cross are doing winter sports. The same is true for my varsity boys. The kid can totally hang with my #2 varsity boy (who is not doing a sport and is having the same run slow or run alone issues). I'll talk to them about meeting up during the break. Both boys should be in the mid to high 4:40s in track this season, so the training partnership would be mutually beneficial.

That being said, the kid could be totally BS-ing me. But I don't think so. He really does want to do well in track and is one of the only athletes to stay after school to lift weights in addition to his runs.

I also like the idea of him not going over 8 until he can do it in an hour. I was actually thinking of 10 in 75 minutes, but the idea is the same. Someone who is doing 14 mile runs should be someone whose easy pace is 7:30 or better.

Worst case scenario if he continues on his current trajectory until practice actually starts in February is that he's fairly injury resistant if somewhat aerobically behind where he should be.

Put your foot down and be a coach. On the days where there is no need for recovery and he comes back after 20 minutes of "running", have him run around the parking lot under your watch. If you say 40 minutes, make it 40 minutes. Or define a 6 mile route, and tell the kids to go run that loop... Letting high schoolers decide anything is a recipe for disaster.

I would also encourage you to take aside your #2 and #1 (ie. top runners) or captains and maybe stick him on them. You are a coach so the kid probably won't listen to you if there is unstructured training...but he should listen to upperclassmen(?). Part of giving certain kids captainships is for them to learn to take their privilege seriously and assume some additional responsibility.

Hopefully they can say to the kid "we're meeting at 3:00pm for 7 miles of winter training. Be there."

For what it's worth, if my children decide to be runners, I hope they get a coach like you; and that has nothing to do with the success I've seen from your privately coached athletes. You clearly care about your athletes' long term development (both as runners and as people) and clearly have their health and best interests at heart. On top of that, you consistently comb these boards for new information, clearly never assuming that you already know it all.

We need more youth coaches like you, across all sports.

LRC front page material there, Smoove. This forum needs more guys posting like you and CoachB.

Coach,

What kind of leg speed does your athlete possess? This sounds like a typical slow twitch runner, But you mentioned he also plays football, which is totally opposite.

When I was his age, I really liked long run too. Looking back on it, it was likely because I felt very productive and I also did not like the stress of hitting interval times. However, I have a fair number of fast twitch muscle fibers.

I am ultimately trying to figure out why your kid likes long run so much.

Jman1 wrote:

LRC front page material there, Smoove. This forum needs more guys posting like you and CoachB and RejectRunner and Island and Jamin and J.S.

Aww thanks bro