I LOVED LOVED the interview and just featured it as QOD and started three threads that were in there.
There was one thing I did disagree with entirely however and that was his talk about how he is choosing the harder thing to be a pro coach.
At the same time, I want to be someone that challenges themselves. And I asked myself, “What would I tell my athletes?” I’m constantly have meetings in my office, encouraging people to step toward the harder thing. And I think I could have stayed in college coaching a long time, and that’s for sure the easiest option for me. We’ve [had] a lot of success. I feel really comfortable in my position, and this is a whole new challenge for me, so trying to kind of take my own medicine as a coach of stepping toward what’s harder.
I TOTALLY disagree. Being a pro coach is MILES and MILES easier than being an NCAA coach. I read this morning that Nick Saban did something recruiting related every single day of the year including XMAS. As a pro coach, particularly based in Flagstaff for Nike, he'll almost have none of that and he'll likely get a pay raise.
He doesn't have to hang out all day at some horrible indoor meet at NAU in January while his 18th best guy runs the third heat of the 5k. He doesn't even need to go to his pros early season meets at all. They are adults - send them on the plane and watch it on tv.
Now, if his goal is to be as dominant of a pro coach as a college coach, then yeah that's harder but that's not going to happen. Well I take that back. If Nike starts sending their top athletes from Ethiopia/Kenya/Uganda to Flagstaff to train under him, then I think he can have Salazar type success.
…, plus we don't know the terms of the Nike contract but he probably only has job security through the next Olympic cycle.
Given his results and reputation, if Nike folds the club for whatever reason, he won’t have difficulty finding work for another team or having a dozen top tier athletes solicit his time to coach them. It’s not as dire for him as it would be for anyone else.
Love the part where he talks about Grijalvas last minute hamstring injury. Think it says a lot about Smith as coach with how much he owned exerting him just a bit too much at the end of his training block and getting him injured. A lot of coaches would blame the athlete for probably going to hard and refuse to humble themselves and look in the memory about what they might have messed up.
Mike Smith always has a hard time peaking his athletes correct. He’s just loader of a coach. Lots of trend training with no actual thought. His deal is culture in college, not pro results.
Love the part where he talks about Grijalvas last minute hamstring injury. Think it says a lot about Smith as coach with how much he owned exerting him just a bit too much at the end of his training block and getting him injured. A lot of coaches would blame the athlete for probably going to hard and refuse to humble themselves and look in the memory about what they might have messed up.
Mike Smith always has a hard time peaking his athletes correct. He’s just loader of a coach. Lots of trend training with no actual thought. His deal is culture in college, not pro results.
part of the issue seems his training seems to be a lot of either 12 miles of threshold work or long overspeed repeats with a lot of rest. Just seems to be a lot of stress.
when Jakob is doing double threshold he's balancing it out with 200 meter hill or track repeats.
Then he transitions into race pace work with relatively short rest for a period of months
year round, Mike Smith seems to "balance" out his double threshold with really hard repeats from 400m-1600m. Doesn't seem like a lot of athletes can handle this
Love the part where he talks about Grijalvas last minute hamstring injury. Think it says a lot about Smith as coach with how much he owned exerting him just a bit too much at the end of his training block and getting him injured. A lot of coaches would blame the athlete for probably going to hard and refuse to humble themselves and look in the memory about what they might have messed up.
Mike Smith always has a hard time peaking his athletes correct. He’s just loader of a coach. Lots of trend training with no actual thought. His deal is culture in college, not pro results.
I’ve been seeing this for years with NAU and not peaking well. Mike Smith is great at that cult culture thing he does with his NCAA team. I was hoping he focused on winning NCAA titles and continuing the legendary seasons at NAU. He’s a team coach not an individual. The major problem is Smith he will no longer have a team and it’s about individual results and medals. He is dropping his benefits at a state school for a contract with pros!?!?!?! This was a dumb move big time. He got some bad advice just to coach some pros. The kicker is Nico Young is with Adidas. This might not end well
Mike Smith always has a hard time peaking his athletes correct. He’s just loader of a coach. Lots of trend training with no actual thought. His deal is culture in college, not pro results.
part of the issue seems his training seems to be a lot of either 12 miles of threshold work or long overspeed repeats with a lot of rest. Just seems to be a lot of stress.
when Jakob is doing double threshold he's balancing it out with 200 meter hill or track repeats.
Then he transitions into race pace work with relatively short rest for a period of months
year round, Mike Smith seems to "balance" out his double threshold with really hard repeats from 400m-1600m. Doesn't seem like a lot of athletes can handle this
Smith sees too many injuries for college and will see more as a pro coach. He had the perfect situation in college at 7000ft and top athletes and still seems get many many injuries. For Pro coaches to succeed they need to be innovative. Smith is a follower who is good at team culture.
Rojo missed the point as usual. As the coach of 5 of the last 7 national champions in cross country, he has job security and a continuing path to success at NAU that he doesn't have as a pro coach. Like Wetmore had at CU, he probably has at least 20 more years at NAU locked in barring sanctions or a complete collapse of the program, neither of which are likely. He has never been a pro coach, so it's new by definition, plus we don't know the terms of the Nike contract but he probably only has job security through the next Olympic cycle. Sure, day-to-day the pro job is easier, but anytime you're giving up tried-and-true locked-in job for something that might be more lucrative but might flame out after 4 years, it's harder.
So you think if Mike Smith doesn't have the success he wants as a Pro coach, or decides he misses the college scene he will not be able to find a job?
I do think he'd get a job. But it's "harder" to leave your current, locked-in-for-life (pretty much), wildly successful and set-up-to-continue current job -- which, by the way, was his dream job and in his dream living location (apparently) -- for the unknowns and relative insecurity of a full-time pro gig. Plus if he's job hunting in 3 years, he's probably not getting the NAU job since it will be taken and he'd have to move, which he doesn't really want to do.
He has never been a pro coach, so it's new by definition, plus we don't know the terms of the Nike contract but he probably only has job security through the next Olympic cycle. Sure, day-to-day the pro job is easier, but anytime you're giving up tried-and-true locked-in job for something that might be more lucrative but might flame out after 4 years, it's harder.
What? He's been moonlighting as a pro coach to numerous top tier distance runners for awhile. It's nothing new to him.
I know it's difficult, but try not to be a moron. He has never been a "full-time" pro coach, it has been his side job. Plus the full-time college job was his main job and his main source of income. None of this was hard to understand from the context of the discussion.
One of my take always from the interview is how Smith has often coached/mentored his athletes to challenge themselves to take on something “hard”. For himself - as he said in the interview - he is challenging himself to do something “hard” by moving on from NAU to coaching a pro group. I’m sure the compensation factored in as well - but not as much as most people think. Smith is unique in his personality/mentality/coaching. There are no guaranty he will succeed at coaching a full-fledge pro group. However, it will be interesting to watch and hopefully he succeeds!
This post was edited 2 minutes after it was posted.
I LOVED LOVED the interview and just featured it as QOD and started three threads that were in there.
There was one thing I did disagree with entirely however and that was his talk about how he is choosing the harder thing to be a pro coach.
At the same time, I want to be someone that challenges themselves. And I asked myself, “What would I tell my athletes?” I’m constantly have meetings in my office, encouraging people to step toward the harder thing. And I think I could have stayed in college coaching a long time, and that’s for sure the easiest option for me. We’ve [had] a lot of success. I feel really comfortable in my position, and this is a whole new challenge for me, so trying to kind of take my own medicine as a coach of stepping toward what’s harder.
I TOTALLY disagree. Being a pro coach is MILES and MILES easier than being an NCAA coach. I read this morning that Nick Saban did something recruiting related every single day of the year including XMAS. As a pro coach, particularly based in Flagstaff for Nike, he'll almost have none of that and he'll likely get a pay raise.
He doesn't have to hang out all day at some horrible indoor meet at NAU in January while his 18th best guy runs the third heat of the 5k. He doesn't even need to go to his pros early season meets at all. They are adults - send them on the plane and watch it on tv.
Now, if his goal is to be as dominant of a pro coach as a college coach, then yeah that's harder but that's not going to happen. Well I take that back. If Nike starts sending their top athletes from Ethiopia/Kenya/Uganda to Flagstaff to train under him, then I think he can have Salazar type success.
I think coaching distance at NAU is much easier than say some random college program. The location is a huge draw that makes recruiting much much easier. And most of coaching collegiately is recruiting.
I TOTALLY disagree. Being a pro coach is MILES and MILES easier than being an NCAA coach.
I totally disagree with you and totally agree with Coach Smith. What’s easier: preparing Nico to face NCAA competition, or preparing Nico to face the likes of Jakob, Aregawi, Fisher, Kiplimo, Kejelcha, Barega, Kwemoi, et al?
Coaching in college especially in todays environment is brutal. It has turned into a 24/7 364 job. The recruiting and travel never stop. Then you have the compliance workload, the paperwork, expense reports, recruiting documentation. Mental health issues with the athletes, kids getting into trouble, grades. The list is endless.
Thank you for linking this article, but why is Sarah Lorge-Butler getting these scoops and not Jonathan Gault?
The whole point of letsrun.com is that we spend A LOT of time aggregating the best running journalism from all over the world and putting it on the homepage which is by far the most popular page on LetsRun. There is no way one entity can produce everything.
Last time I checked, Sarah isn't doing two podcasts a week like Jonathan.
But in this case, he's been extremely busy working on a feature on what the hell is going on in the men's 800 right now and interviewing coaches and experts from all over the world. In the article, he will break the news of Project 99 - the attempt at the first sub-140 800 in history.
A feature story like that takes A LOT of time and resources- infinitely more than a simple Q&A. It's a shame you may not be able to read it as I may make it SC only. It certainly will be behind the SC paywall at some point.
omg really I love when my SC membership matters normally I feel like I'm throwing money into the void like you guys could at least turn ads off for me
and I'm probably in the minority on this but I'd way rather get some in depth Jon Gault reporting on whatever the hell is going on in Flagstaff now. The domination NAU had at NCAA XC for like 7 years + the track domination holding CRs in the 3k-10k and #2 in the 1500, was absolutely legendary, and I think it's a shame we didn't get more stuff like Running With the Boys in my opinion, especially with Nico's incredible season. Past that, we know Jakob trains there a lot, Nur, Kincaid, and Grijalva are training together (and Nico Young soon if not already), plus Nikki Hiltz. And other top pros come in and out depending on their schedules.
The 800 article still sounds really cool though I can't wait to read it in full for as long as I want :)
I LOVED LOVED the interview and just featured it as QOD and started three threads that were in there.
There was one thing I did disagree with entirely however and that was his talk about how he is choosing the harder thing to be a pro coach.
At the same time, I want to be someone that challenges themselves. And I asked myself, “What would I tell my athletes?” I’m constantly have meetings in my office, encouraging people to step toward the harder thing. And I think I could have stayed in college coaching a long time, and that’s for sure the easiest option for me. We’ve [had] a lot of success. I feel really comfortable in my position, and this is a whole new challenge for me, so trying to kind of take my own medicine as a coach of stepping toward what’s harder.
I TOTALLY disagree. Being a pro coach is MILES and MILES easier than being an NCAA coach. I read this morning that Nick Saban did something recruiting related every single day of the year including XMAS. As a pro coach, particularly based in Flagstaff for Nike, he'll almost have none of that and he'll likely get a pay raise.
He doesn't have to hang out all day at some horrible indoor meet at NAU in January while his 18th best guy runs the third heat of the 5k. He doesn't even need to go to his pros early season meets at all. They are adults - send them on the plane and watch it on tv.
Now, if his goal is to be as dominant of a pro coach as a college coach, then yeah that's harder but that's not going to happen. Well I take that back. If Nike starts sending their top athletes from Ethiopia/Kenya/Uganda to Flagstaff to train under him, then I think he can have Salazar type success.