What is the worst running advice a coach has given you?

When I was obviously a middle of the pack guy in XC:

"Stay with the front runners as long as possible. Each time you run, you'll be able to hang on a little longer."

no offense, thats how I got faster as a mid pack runner, going out harder and trying to stay up there as long as possible. I kept getting better and better. For me it was good advice.

Have to disagree with you there. I think more high schoolers should be told to get up there and try to hang on as long as possible. It worked for me, and others on our team. Some took longer than others, but it was more mental than physical.

Yeah well maybe all the rest of the advice that I got was really really good :)

Anyway, it was an assistant coach in college, not HS. Talking about a 10K. At the time I was a 35 minute guy, should I really run my first mile in sub 5?

My high school coach's solution to me being able to leg press the entire stack on the Universal Gym:

"you need to push that seat forward all the way so your ankles are right up against your butt, you need to make it hurt, the more it hurts the better it is for you"

of course that was three knee surgeries ago, so maybe I'm paraphrasing a bit...

Don't move up in distance stick with the 400 meters.

That was from my coach in Junior College.

just keep running and you'll be ok (I was overtraining, and I was ok, about 2 months later)

"In every dual meet and in every invite, you will run for a PR every time out. Each one of you will go all out in every race." - this being from a high school coach who had the team run a dual meet every week and an invite every week...supposively all of us were supposed to PR in each one of those races.

Here'sthe best

"Every distance race is just ?? 400's in a row, so you being a 5k-10k guy should train with the 400 meter runners."

From a New England Diii coach who has a number of All Americans before his retirement a few years ago. Most fo which were in the 400? I wonder why?

"Have Big Fun" whether she was talking to us before a race, mid race, or post race.

"If you're not in the top 5-20 at the 2 mile, you're season is done."

My former coach said this to the entire team one time at the conference meet. We were all middle pack runners and all tried to lead from the start. By two miles everyone was dead and we ended up last in a bad conference.

"You need to build your speed to ever be competitive in the 10k.

Same guy had us on the track 3-4 times per week. I went from sub 33 in practice to mid 34s on the track.

Any coach who tells his runners to get to the lead from the start. This is the least efficient way to race and is what cost Wisconsin the title at NCAAs this year.

Any coach who favors intensity over distance. For short term, it might be better to run guys into the ground, but for long term development, you need long medium paced runs, not intervals.

More favorites

"Splits? Why do you need splits?"

"I don't care about racing, I care about people and children"

This coming from my DI coach, I shit you not

"Just puff and go! Puff and go!" - my first college coach, telling me to take a couple hits from an inhaler during my freshman year Southeast Regional (though it ended up not being asthma and the inhaler had never worked before).

"It's not that you're having a bad workout - they're just better than you." - Same coach, this time during a set of repeat quarters when I fell behind our main pack.

when asking for 1600m race stratagey......

"Just take right turns and get back as soon as you can."

tommygunner wrote:

when asking for 1600m race stratagey......

"Just take right turns and get back as soon as you can."

Any coach who thinks you run on a track clock wise, has got to be the dumbest.

"You'll be more help to the team writing about the meets for the paper than running in them."

Actually good advice, as it motivated me to keep running and improve, and also led to a career in running journalism - ok, so maybe it WAS bad advice.