It's actually "forgoing."
"Foregoing" means "going before" or "preceding"; "forgoing" means "skipping" or "refraining" from.
"I think the coaches and the competition I'd encounter would not help me develop to my full potential. For the foregoing reasons, I have decided that I'm forgoing high school running."
No shame--it's a tricky distinction, and people get it wrong about as frequently as the one between "discreet" and "discrete."
Simple - and not getting into the idea of appropriate mileage or whatever, that is between you and your coach and your long-term goals (funny how US athletes - even Rupp - can't compete with Africans of a similar age who do run higher mileage) - if your goal is to make the US team for World Juniors next year, then how would the HS season help that? As another said there are LOTS of meets to enter that don't require being part of a HS team. Perhaps if more athletes thought about trying to be better internationally (even as Juniors) then as silly "state champs" the US could actually compete with Africans, rather than importing them (Lagat) or accusing them of doping.
I didn't read all the posts, but have you considered consulting your girlfriend? You should get her opinion.
If you're going to try to be diplomatic and run for your team but be coached by your private coach, don't try and close this deal yourself. Adults in authority situations (your coach or principal or whatever) aren't going to like you challenging their authority. If they have a complex about it they will beat you down and make you feel like the bad guy. If they are reasonable, they are probably still going to say no and expect you to like it.
Have your parents make this deal. The coach (or principal or whoever may be involved in authorizing this) cannot talk to your parents like someone who is subject to non-negotiable rules...the relationship is in your favor. The authority figures in your school will be in the position of defending their position because your parents are essentially their customers...your principal and coach have to prove they are watching out for your interests. Now they also have to watch out for everyone's interests and there may also be legal reasons this can't be allowed (insurance, etc) but at least they have to make their case to your parents instead of just saying "No" and expecting you to like it.
I give you 50% odds of getting approval using your parents and 5% if you make the case yourself.
Duck in the whatever did you not hear him say that he pred in the 2 and 5k this summer after the track season was already over? So don't be so quick to call troll.
Also I personally know this guy, have met the 2 coaches he's talking about and understand his decision and I say go for it. It's probably the best running decision he could make right now.
HS parent wrote:
You have to make your own decisions.
But since you've asked for other's opinions, here are my thoughts.
I personally think you are running way too many miles for a HS student. Where are you going to take it from here in the future? My son runs almost exactly the same times as you've posted off of about 35 to 40 miles a week. He just finished his sophomore year. His coach wants him to go to 50 this coming year and 60 his senior year. Maybe you can sustain this level but injury or burn out seems likely. College coaches we have talked to have always been interested in what sort of miles my son is running. They have been impressed with his relatively low mileage, I think because they know there is plenty left to work with.
Also, being part of a team and getting along with others is a pretty important part of life. You might consider just sitting down with your school coach and discussing things rather than going off on your own. Some of my son's best moments in sports have been as part of the relay team, even though he individually doesn't get much glory from it and it sometimes tires him out for his individual performances. Doing things for the team as opposed to just for oneself is also a pretty good quality to develop, in my opinion.
At some point in your life you are going to have to work and get along with people that you don't necessarily like or agree with. It's an important skill to develop. As several have pointed out, you can always run more miles on your own, right?
Some of what you say is right on the mark. I think it depends on the situation. I was running those kinds of times off 35 miles a week and my coach had the whole philosophy that we would leave a huge upside for college. He was a sub 14/sub 29 guy as an athlete and practically guaranteed me I'd be able to break 14 in college. So I was patient because I trusted him.
Unfortunately many coaches only look at the times you've put up. I was good enough to walk on at a PAC-10 school but my coach there didn't pick up where my previous coach left off and have a long term plan for me. He treated me like a walk on and I was expected to jump into the varsity runners' workouts and suck it up. Well...that didn't work at all for me and I never improved at all. I was essentially self-coached but having to jump into murderous interval workouts at random.
Were I able to do it again I wouldn't have left any upside for college. Perhaps I'd have gotten injured. But with some more aerobic work I feel it was likely I'd have been a 4:10/9:00 guy and my college coach would've been kissing my ass coming in. And I'd have been able to jump into the team workouts without overtraining. And every race wouldn't have been way over my head.
I do think you should progress steadily and not just go crazy out of the box. If you haven't worked the 70 range don't average over 100. But don't just hang out down at 35 thinking college coaches are going to be impressed with your upside. Most of them want results today and are going to think you suck until you actually run times rather than projecting them on paper.
And I think too many people still have it backwards. Mileage is not the killer. Intensity is the killer. The story of many African superstars is a well-developed aerobic base (lots of fairly easy long distance) at a young age, then reduction or holding in place of mileage and a shift to race-specific intense training around age 20, after which they become world-beaters at 22. We seem to think we should do intensity right away at 30mpw and slowly up the mileage over the years with the same training pattern repeated forever. Try and find out what Rupp, Ritz, and Hall did in HS. I doubt they would have all been near 4:00 for the mile on 35 miles a week.
duck in the chicken wrote:
Your 2-mile time is BS. There are no 1600m state champs with that PB in the Pacific Northwest.
Source: Athletic.net
Get out, troll.
Since he said his 2 mile and 5k pr's have come recently while working on base, they probably came in some summer all-comers meet. A result like that might not register in the athletic.net database.
Your 5k PR is only 15:30 off 100 mile weeks? I know its just base training, but I know kids that can run that on 50-60 mpw that are probably working a hell of a lot less than you.
aaaaaaaaaaaaaa wrote:
Were I able to do it again I wouldn't have left any upside for college. Perhaps I'd have gotten injured. But with some more aerobic work I feel it was likely I'd have been a 4:10/9:00 guy and my college coach would've been kissing my ass coming in. And I'd have been able to jump into the team workouts without overtraining. And every race wouldn't have been way over my head.
I do think you should progress steadily and not just go crazy out of the box. If you haven't worked the 70 range don't average over 100. But don't just hang out down at 35 thinking college coaches are going to be impressed with your upside. Most of them want results today and are going to think you suck until you actually run times rather than projecting them on paper.
And I think too many people still have it backwards. Mileage is not the killer. Intensity is the killer. The story of many African superstars is a well-developed aerobic base (lots of fairly easy long distance) at a young age, then reduction or holding in place of mileage and a shift to race-specific intense training around age 20, after which they become world-beaters at 22. We seem to think we should do intensity right away at 30mpw and slowly up the mileage over the years with the same training pattern repeated forever. Try and find out what Rupp, Ritz, and Hall did in HS. I doubt they would have all been near 4:00 for the mile on 35 miles a week.
Interesting thoughts.
I'm not a coach so I really can't offer a great opinion about which approach is better. I do worry when I see kids like Kenny Cormier, who was home schooled and incredibly driven, running 120+ miles a week pretty much on his own, college scholarship, etc, then comes down with an injury his freshman year and then totally drops out of the sport. I don't really know the details, but sounds like burn out to me.
My own son has made steady progress so far, and his 35 - 40 miles a week are generally not at all intense. In fact he often does his long run with me at a 9 min pace. So far it has worked pretty well for him and I think he will ramp it up the next 2 years.
But certainly everyone is different and has to go by their own training needs and goals. For my son, he just likes running, enjoys being part of the team, and especially likes racing, but running is not a career goal for him. Sounds like it is a major goal for the OP, and I wish him the best.
I don't think it's necessary to wait. If you can do more now, do it. You never know what life is going to throw at you, you need to take advantage of opportunities when they present themselves.
Who would you rather be?
The 19 year old who has run 4:20 off of 40 mpw
or
The 19 year old who has run 4:10 off of 70 mpw
I know I'd rather be the guy who is one step ahead. If I'm ahead now, the 4:20 guys isn't going to catch me this season. Will he catch me eventually? Maybe, it depends on both of our potentials. But why make yourself have to play catch up?
If you never improve beyond your high school times, maybe that was all you had in you. You can't burn out if you never catch fire.
Here are some more things to weigh:
1.) Most coaches find recruits by attending championships and scanning big meet results. As a state champion, you will be seen by someone. If you forgo the regular high school meets, but don't run fast enough to qualify for Footlocker, etc, you won't be on anyone's radar. While you can do legwork on your own by contacting coaches, these coaches will be unlikely to give you a scholarship. They will not consider how fast you ran at a road race or something similar.
2.) I am very wary of people with stories like yours for several reasons. Often times, they don't know nearly as much as they think, but they talk big anyway and become a negative force on the team. If you complain about your high school coach, you'll probably complain about your college coach and training. This would be detrimental to the team dynamic. It also indicates you have a poor ability to communicate effectively and to work with people you disagree with. None of these may be true for you, and I have coached a couple of individuals in similar circumstances that turned out to be great contributors, but they were by far the minority. Most of the kids who went their own way in high school just caused me a big headache until they eventually quit.
3.) I agree with some earlier posters. When I hear a 17 y.o. talking about breaking 100 mile weeks, my first thought is always "where are they going to go from there?"
These are not attacks on you personally, but I did think you should know what some of the perceptions of you may be.
OP, I will offer my advice because I was in a pretty similar situation in HS. The difference was I didn't want to leave my HS coach for another, I wanted to be self coached. Despite the fact that I ran ridiculously better when training myself, you wouldn't believe how many people just thought I was a dumb punk kid. There was no way anyone was going to listen to me, regardless of the argument or results. I stayed on the team and underperformed save for the two seasons my coach allowed me to have some say in my training. The coaches still probably think of me as a rebellious pain in the ass, but I was just trying to run the best I could. My HS coach's methods would not allow me to do this.
My advice for you is to talk about this with your parents and your new coach and formulate a plan to talk with your old coach. The ideal situation, imo, would be to train with your new coach but still race in the HS circuit. You can treat races more like workouts so you don't screw up your training by overracing. You'll still be able to run at regionals, state, etc, and will be a part of a group, something you don't appreciate until you've been away from one for a while. Also, don't you have to represent your school at meets like Arcadia?
As for your future in running, I know it's hard, but don't bank on running as the future of your life. It's really something you have to learn yourself, but if running is the only thing in your life, you will be miserable any time you're injured or your training isn't going well. VERY few runners end up with running careers. Take it one step at a time and focus more on short term goals than long term ones. Your PRs are good but nothing special. Just try to train consistently and safely and enjoy running. Don't get to crazy with the mileage. 105mpw is a damn lot for someone your age and you're most likely on a knife's edge between PRing and serious injury. Look at Tegenkamp. He was injured a lot in college because he'd always try and run 90mpw or more. It would work for short time and then he'd get injured. He realized months-years of consistent 70mpw is better than bouts of 90mpw broken up with time off due to injury. Don't get caught up in the mileage trap.
In the end it's your life and your decision. Consider the words of guys who've gone through similar experiences, and think long and hard before you decide what's best for you. Time is a precious thing; you only get one shot.
Good luck.
WHEN I HEAR 17 YEAR OLD AND 100 MILE WEEKS, I THINK OF MATT WINTHROW WINNING FOOTLOCKER AND RUNNING 13:35 AS A COLLEGE FRESHMAN. IF HE DIDN'T RUN SUCH HIGH MILEAGE. HE NEVER WOULD HAVE RAN THAT FAST. OT EVEN AS A SENIOR IN COLLEGE.
Why does everyone think it is in every distance runner's best interest to have a 10+ year career? Realize that if you put together 4 years in high school and 5 years in college that is 9 years. Not everyone is Lagat or Geb and planning for 20 years in the sport.
I think if you analyzed all the world class runners you would find that most of them have shorter careers than the average Joe Blow US college guy. Even Daniel Komen was only around for a few years.
Why do we think it is better for a guy to take it easy so he can extend his career through college (9 years), especially when he is currently not demonstrating that he will ever be at the professional level? Why in the world do we think it is a great idea for someone to have a 10 year half-ass distraction in the most important years of one's life.
I would definitely rather have had a 3 year running career that ended up with me being a footlocker finalist or 9:00 2 miler than having a 9 year career as a perpetual 4:20 miler. And even if I eked out an 8:50 over that 9 year career I would still trade that in for 9:00 as a high schooler...at least I'd have been near the top instead of perpetually mediocre. And the bonus would be I'd move on with my life and use the time I saved pursuing what comes after running.
Why do we criticize guys who blew up in their first year of college after brilliant high school running? They kicked some ass, took their shot at it and it didn't work out, and then they were mature enough to move on with life instead of hanging on forever hoping to get the magic back. We should admire these people for their realism.
Letsrun as a website is so popular because of the hordes of unsatisfied high school 4:20 guys who left half their game on the table and are now back here looking around for clues as to how fast they might have run had they done something different. They are making happy looking numbers on paper to feel good about the fact that they let the best gift they ever had go because of some poor idea that competitive running lasts forever.
Strike while the iron is hot. Don't train beyond what your body can handle, be smart about it, but by no means do you want to leave anything on the table for next year.
Why would you want to half ass your training for 4 years and only start to train for real when you get to college? You should be at the top of your game when you get to college, then you can compete well, and if you are one of the very lucky few who can have a 10 year progression of improvement you might be able to go pro when you come out of college. If you flame out after 1 year, well that was going to happen anyway, except that you will delay that for 4 years goofing around in high school and take 4 extra years to get to where you were going to go anyway.
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...
This is what Alan Culpepper did and it worked ok for him...