PLEASE HELP ME PEAK FOR STATE?! Malmo?..ANYONE?!

He said 10-14 days, which is about right really. I gotta agree with the people who say to keep the volume fairly consistent. In my experience, the more we backed off the mileage, the worse my runners felt.

You are already on a good progression. Your coach is doing a good job and you are getting stronger and faster. Listen to him and you probably won't go wrong. Believe in yourself and your coach. Peaking is half mental in that you have to get up for the big day and not let the pressure mess with you. Know in your mind that you are physically ready and get your head ready for a HARD effort and know it will HURT.

Now for specifics if you were in charge of your own workouts:

At your age and experience you only need to back off the last 14 days. At that point you won't lose fitness but you can screw things up by going too hard. Something like this:

Days to race - workout

14 - Normal workout like 6x800 or 4-5x1000 with 4x150 quick controlled strides after.

13 easy

12 easy + strides

11 easy

10 1mi time trial NOT QUITE ALL OUT, 4x strides before and after.

9 easy

8 easy + strides

7 longish run say 75% of normal long run

6 easy

5 light workout along the lines of 8x200 at 1mi Time trial pace or just slightly faster with jog 200 recover NO WALKING!

4 easy

3 easy + strides - by now, your legs are feeling fresh and you want to run. If not, take tomorrow OFF

2 easy

1 easy + strides

0 Go like hell.

Next race is probably a week later. Just repeat the last 6 days.

Good luck.

The above schedule looks pretty good. I would possibly suggest a 2 mile run at race pace with 90 seconds rest and 5 x 400m at 2 mile race pace with 30 seconds rest on Day 10 instead. It will simulate race like stress but not fry you. 1 mile is good for getting speed tweaked, but, in XC he may benefit more from strength work than speed. Keep it up and, as others said, listen to your coach. He has done well with you so far. Talk to him about whatever ideas you come with here.

Listen Up wrote:

The last week should be pace work and strides with reduced volume. The key is not to try to hammer. Don't suddenly think that you need to do a ton of sharpening at 800 pace...unless you want to be good and sore.

This advice works for me. I remember telling my coach that for some reason strides were making me sore and fatigued for my races but he still had me do them before the conference meet in high school and I was on the starting line sore. Makes no sense. The work is done. Reap the benefits. I'm peaking for a 5k now. The race is tomorrow and I'm not running today. I reduced mileage 80% last week and 50% this week but kept intensity.

FYI - My "strides" were probably not strides but more like 800 pace work.

I also agree that you needn't worry about trying to find a kick at this point in the season. Use your strengths. Be so far ahead of your competitors that you don't need to kick.

The author of this specific retort has probably tuned out by now, but here is Tim Noakes on the subject:

"No one knows how long one should taper before a big race, but I believe that it may take at least 10-14 days and possibly even longer for the body to fully recover from months of heavy training and racing." (third edition, Lore of Running, pg. 191)

Workouts have two effects--tearing your body down (minute muscle tears that are later repaired, pounding on joints, etc.) and building it up (increasing capillary activity, improved lactate tolerance, etc.) I believe it takes 10-14 days for the negative effects of repeated hard workouts to be fully gone--while the positive effects, if a taper is done properly, should still be there. You are looking for the optimal window where the negative effects of training are gone, but the positive ones remain. You may get some positive benefits of running 20x400 at goal pace 2 days before state, yes, but all the negative effects will cancel it out. Thus, your performance will be worse, and it is reasonable to say you must WAIT to see full effects of workouts, which is what I originally said. The body has to RECOVER before performance is optimized.

You are welcome to disagree with me, but don't pretend this is out of left field.

I agree with those who have bucked the trend of cutting volume and increasing intensity ... I'm a proponent of maintaining volume and cutting intensity at the end of the season. Most people don't build up the intensity early enough to be able to pull it off, though.

Most High School programs will have a League race 14 days days before, a regional race 7 days before the key race (State). The schedule does not reflect these.