We are young we run free wrote:
Didn't his high school coach Bruce Edwards retire?
His coach--see interview below--simply used Daniels' book for training too!
A Brief Chat With Bruce Edwards, Coach Of German Fernandez
06/09/2008 12:08 AM
by Amby Burfoot
Bruce Edwards has been German Fernandez's cross-country coach for four years, and his de-facto track coach for just the most recent track season. The results of that collaboration reverberated through the USA track community a little more than a week ago when Fernandez won the distance double at the California State meet, taking the 1600 in an unexpectedly fast 4:00.29 and the 3200 (two and a half hours later) in 8:34.23. Edwards is a 60-year-old math teacher at Riverbank High, about 90 miles east of San Francisco. He once competed against prodigies named Lindgren and Prefontaine, although the then-Berkeley-undergrad was well back with a six-mile cross country best of 29:58. Here, Edwards reflects on what Fernandez has accomplished this spring, the conservative approach they've followed, where Fernandez is headed next, and what we might expect in the future.
Everyone knew German Fernandez was a talent, but I think his State meet results still shocked a lot of people. How about you?
Bruce Edwards: From some of his previous doubles, I thought he could run 4:02 and 8:39. That's what we had discussed as his goal paces. But we also knew the competition could be tough at States, particularly in the mile. That was the much tougher race for German. And we haven't done any speed work all year. He hasn't run anything faster in practice than a few 200s in 30 seconds. So he just decided to run that pace. He didn't want anything tactical. His thinking was, "If anyone's ready to stick with me at that pace, fine, they're invited. And if they can out kick me at the end, great, they can thank me for setting things up the whole way." He has an incredible sense of pace. He ran the first 800 in 2:00.4, and the last 800 in 1:59.8. His fastest 400 was the third one. Who ever does that? The meet had a clock running at the 200 meters as well as the start/finish. That helped him settle into his pace, and it got the crowd really excited. When he came past the 200-to-go in 3:29/3:30, the place was going nuts.
So now we're all wondering what's next – a serious attempt at breaking 4 minutes, a run after Jeff Nelson's high school record 2-mile of 8:36.3, trying to make it to the Olympic Trials in the 5000 meters?
BE: We're sticking with the plan we've had all along. We're going to the Nike Nationals this weekend in North Carolina, and hoping for a good 2-mile. It's 100-percent certain that German is ready to run under 8:36 but only 30 percent certain that he'll get the record in North Carolina. The weather could play a big role. We're refusing to get caught up in the sub-4:00 hype. I can tell you that this kid is no speed merchant like an Alan Webb or Jim Ryun. He's a different kind of talent. And he also understands the big picture, and the long term. He went to the World XC this March, and he was 25th in the Junior race. So he knows where he stands. He knows there are ten other kids around the world his age who can do what he did at States. He could run 13:40 or 13:45 for 5000 right now, but that wouldn't prove anything. He understands this. He listens. We've talked a lot about the fact that he can have a big influence on other young runners. That's important to him. He wants to set a good example, and excite others the way he did at States, and inspire other runners.
How did you first connect with German? Did you know he'd be great from the beginning?
BE: He ran 4:22 [for one mile] in his 9th grade track season, but he was doing a lot of other sports then – football, basketball, soccer. I had to work hard to get him out for cross-country. Within a month, he had run 16:04 for a 5K course. Then in October, he broke the course record on a shorter course. The previous record-holder had run 8:58 [for two miles] in track. That was when I said, "Okay, German, we have to sit down and see if we can develop a serious relationship here." I had to begin working toward the point where he would have complete trust and confidence in me. It didn't come easy. There were some setbacks along the way. I have to give a lot of credit to my assistant Johnny Vizcaino for helping me develop that relationship with German.
His track improvement seemed dramatic this year. Is there a reason for that?
BE: He had injuries the last two track seasons. I'm not the school track coach; I coach tennis. But this year we agreed that we'd work together through the track season to try to avoid injuries and see what he could do. We had one narrow escape. He had an Achilles problem in April. He's a quiet kid and didn't speak up, but it was my mistake for not noticing the signals soon enough. He got on his bike and did just bicycle riding for 10 days, then he was fine. It was a point in the season where we had already planned a rest phase anyway. But it was scary.
Our training is pure Jack Daniels. I have a masters degree in physiology myself – I did my thesis on VO2 max – and I understand where Jack is coming from with his training philosophy, and I agree with it. All of German's training is based on the training paces in Jack's book. I could have pushed German more on the speed end of his training, but I didn't feel that it was worth the risk. We wanted to avoid those injuries he had the last two seasons.
If you want to know our secrets, he does 300 push ups every night, and 200 crunches, and he rides his bike ten minutes every day. He runs six days a week – 12 workouts – and I give him one rest day. There, that's it, now you know everything. I think the bike riding is good to develop the quads and stretch the calf muscle. Besides, as a runner you're never far away from an injury that's going to force you to get off your feet and your body weight, and cycling is a good activity for those times, so it's good to stay in touch with it.
You've coached for a long time. Have you had other kids with German's talent?
BE: Not with as much talent, not as much genetic ability. But that's only part of the equation. German is also a very hard worker. He never misses a day when we're planning to run. I've had maybe one or two other kids with good talent, but they didn't have the focus and work ethic. I think I also might have trained those kids too hard. Looking back, I feel bad about that now. Sometimes you cut the flowers too soon. I like to think I helped German flower when he was supposed to flower. When you're coaching someone with his talent, one of the things you think about a lot is that you have a responsibility not to mess him up.
What do you think he can do in the future?
BE: He can do more. He can run a lot faster. Like I've been explaining, I coached him conservatively. We focused on getting strong at the paces that were comfortable for him. He hasn't done hills. He hasn't done hard speed work. He's going to have a very nice transition to college. A year from now, I could see him holding 64s for 5000 meters. When you do the math, that's about 13:18. I think that would be a realistic next step for him.