In CROSS COUNTRY how do you get kids to attend practice?

hs girls coach wrote:

We don't have a strict attendance policy. We're probably unique as a coaching staff in that every one of the coaches on our staff grew up as a multi-sport athlete. We see the value in kids trying different activities and making the decision on their own on what to prioritize.

That's not to say that we don't encourage great attendance. We celebrate the underclassmen that choose to come to an optional run for the first time. We celebrate upperclassmen that run carpools for new runners. We celebrate mileage landmarks and new long runs. We preach good communication and planning in advance when you have a conflict and celebrate those athletes that get in a solo run when they have to miss a practice.

Most importantly, we create an atmosphere where kids have fun at practice and we get good results, so kids want to make the commitment. If I look back at our top 7 in school history, only 2 started high school with cross country as their primary sport.
If we had incredibly strict attendance, we'd end up losing those kids before they even gave the sport a shot. Watching them fall in love with the sport and make the jump to serious runners and state champions is one of the best parts of coaching.

Yuotf214 wrote:

old man shuffle wrote:

I'm old. I don't even understand the question. In my day, if you committed to something, you showed up. On time. Every time.

Not showing up for something you committed to? I don't get that. I'm old.

I agree with this and this is an interesting discussion.
Enthusiasm in these young guys also depends on their personal situation.

I recruited from the middle schools, attended nearly every middle school meet and it seems the cross country team ended up with the poorer kids.

The best teams at the state ( I got the guys there after 3 years) had these dads who were runners, young, professionals, it seems, wearing Frank Shorter jackets and wearing wire rimmed glasses. They were professionals of some kind who instilled that discipline in their young…

I actually had two brothers, who worked at Hardy’s.. they couldn’t show up for Saturday practices because they were the bread winners of the family. No mom. They actually got their dad on at Hardy’s

Id get in my car and several

times go to their apartment and try to get them while practice was going on… they were too tired. They had worked until closing. The priority was and should have been work. A lot of things go into this I guess.

Showing up for practice. Enthusiasm.
Luck, where you live, what the parents do.

Yuotf214 wrote:

hs girls coach wrote:

We don't have a strict attendance policy. We're probably unique as a coaching staff in that every one of the coaches on our staff grew up as a multi-sport athlete. We see the value in kids trying different activities and making the decision on their own on what to prioritize.

That's not to say that we don't encourage great attendance. We celebrate the underclassmen that choose to come to an optional run for the first time. We celebrate upperclassmen that run carpools for new runners. We celebrate mileage landmarks and new long runs. We preach good communication and planning in advance when you have a conflict and celebrate those athletes that get in a solo run when they have to miss a practice.

Most importantly, we create an atmosphere where kids have fun at practice and we get good results, so kids want to make the commitment. If I look back at our top 7 in school history, only 2 started high school with cross country as their primary sport.
If we had incredibly strict attendance, we'd end up losing those kids before they even gave the sport a shot. Watching them fall in love with the sport and make the jump to serious runners and state champions is one of the best parts of coaching.

Same here.

I couldn’t have an attendance policy for the reasons cited.

I also had mileage t-shirts made and I must admit, I maintained 17 running logs and went over them once a week, the last thing I’d do is enter in their individual logs what they had done that day.

The big thing in the summer was the treasure hunt. I’d buy gift certificates from Jiffy Treet, Road Runner Sports and a few other places and had 30 or 40 coffee cans and I would spread them out starting at 2 miles ( one located on my mother in laws porch) out to about 4 or 5 miles and we’d all meet back about midway at Jiffy Treet and hour and a half or so later.

My favorite thing was taking them to post race breakfast after summer races. But I’ve talked about that before… the rule was, it had to be a mom and pop breakfast diner.. the looks we got when 15 HS runners and their coach came walking in was priceless

Like, I said, I had a bunch of hard scrabble kids. I had a 16.30 freshman once who was so poor, I’d call his house and you could hear every animal under the sun, barking, chirping, screaming…This kids dad made him call me up from time to time and ask for a little money..His sister who I didn’t even k ow stopped my wife and I in a mall parking lot and ask me for a little money. I think he decided to go to work his junior year and stopped running
He was a great kid considering everything and after I retired and my dad died ( 10 years or so later) I came home, walked into a diner and there he was… I didn’t say a word to him… Ive felt bad about it every since. THE POTENTIAL

Great topic. How do you inspire kids to want to come to practice?

ClubRunnah wrote:

The issue we have with attendance isn't that the kids are lazy and just not showing up, it's that they are the leaders of the school. They are the kids in student government, band, school plays, scholastic clubs, you name it.

I find it very difficult to tell some kid that I don't want him on the XC team if he can't be at every single practice, when I know he is probably an 18 min guy on his best day.

I lose nothing by having him come to practice more days than not, where he loses everything (xc related) by me kicking him off the team. I also 100% lose the chance to maybe make him into an every day guy.

I try to balance it out. I don't want to be some Little League Parent Syndrome where I act like every meet is the Olympic Trials but I don't want to be The Jogging Club either.

bigmig19 wrote:

ClubRunnah wrote:

The issue we have with attendance isn't that the kids are lazy and just not showing up, it's that they are the leaders of the school. They are the kids in student government, band, school plays, scholastic clubs, you name it.

I find it very difficult to tell some kid that I don't want him on the XC team if he can't be at every single practice, when I know he is probably an 18 min guy on his best day.

I lose nothing by having him come to practice more days than not, where he loses everything (xc related) by me kicking him off the team. I also 100% lose the chance to maybe make him into an every day guy.

I try to balance it out. I don't want to be some Little League Parent Syndrome where I act like every meet is the Olympic Trials but I don't want to be The Jogging Club either.

Yea...Im more with you than the draconian "be here or you are off the team" approach. My kids team does that and I see that they are fearful all the time. Bad Ju Ju. This isnt football, there are no plays/chemistry to practice. l.

Jed Clampett wrote:

HRE wrote:

Maybe I'm showing my age here but my policy would be that if you have an unexcused absence in a particular week you don't race in that week's meet. If you have three unexcused absences you're done for the season but you're welcome to come back next year.

The way I see the business of getting kids to want to come to practice is that you explain at the start of the season that they're in a competitive sport, that it's your job to make them and the team into the best runners you can. If they're serious about the sport you shouldn't need to make them want to come to practice. They should want to come to practice because they understand that's what will get them to be as good as they can be.

Of course you have kids who really don't care about the competitive part of the sport very much. They're there because they have friends in the team, to add an extracurricular activity for their college applications, and so on. That's fine as long as they understand that they need to show up.

HRE, I did have the rule that if they missed practice they would miss a meet and I stuck to it even if it meant we would finish last in a meet we had a chance to win! However, looking back it is easy to see that there were exceptions to this rule and I like the suggestion that the consideration of the individual is a good idea. In the 2020s I do not know how they tolerate all the exceptions they do, that would have driven me to running over a cliff in my younger years! I am thinking that I would have to do a ton of explaining before the first practice and that the first year I might have to look the other way a few times and then explain to them later that it was a no-no to miss the practice the way that their family did. Nowadays it is often the parents, not the kids as much. It was good to hear from you!

OhioCoach wrote:

A good topic - and so far hasn't gone down a super negative path like sometimes happens here!!
I coach a team of 40+ girls and we have a wide spectrum - some proper runners, some who like running but maybe aren't that gifted, some who are doing XC to get PE credit and some who just are there for the social aspect. Lots of high achievers as well, involved in other activities like Student Council, club sports, band, leadership programs, etc. which sometimes take them away from practice or races. My goal as their coach is to field as competitive team as we can without risking injury, but more importantly to turn them into runners for the rest of their lives for all the benefits I've seen from running (physical and mental health, confidence, camaraderie, etc.). We've had some really good years and some not so good - but like all of you have seen in your running if you show up consistently and give effort you will see progress, and we've seen that.

Our rule is 2 unexcused absences before you miss a meet, and I have the discretion to what is excused versus not...I am pretty reasonable but I am firm that they must communicate with me when they are missing, why they are missing, and we agree on the implications. I also make it clear up front that if they do have competing priorities with other activities, and it winds up impacting how much they're able to race, there are no hard feelings and I don't think less of them and I'm not mad at them. Part of being that age is that they need to learn how to communicate with an adult. Unless they're being deceitful or doing something they shouldn't, they should be comfortable enough to approach me and say what's going on. It's pretty straightforward - they know the potential consequences of missing practice, they have a choice, and if they choose the other activity and have to miss an extra meet or 2 that's fine by me.

We also give every runner at least one meet off per season - they can fit in other things around that, it helps reduce injury, it keeps them fresher, and it can always be that meet that they are being "punished" for missing practices. It's pretty rare that a top runner prioritizes other activities over running, so I explain to the girls who do have to miss from time to time that they may be able to race, but maybe not Varsity or JV (thank heavens for Open races!). Getting a spot on Varsity or JV is a privilege to be earned and the person with better attendance is going to get that spot over someone who is a little more spotty.

Once the girls have gone through a few weeks, we (coaches) know who is committed and who isn't. We know who is really battling some aches and pains, and who is just dogging it. Each girl is assigned an individual coach who sits down with them weekly to review their log, talk race strategy, and check in with them. It's pretty apparent who is into it, and who is there for other reasons...and that's OK. We focus on the ones who want the coaching - the others we don't nag, we guide them but we don't babysit them, and several of them have actually turned into pretty committed runners after a season or two BECAUSE we weren't making it a miserable experience for them.

XC is different than other sports - as long as someone isn't being disruptive at practice, or dragging down the effort level of others, if they show up and give a moderate effort they won't see the results they might otherwise but that's their choice. They won't take a spot away from another runner who is more committed so focus on who is there and working hard.

randysnakes wrote:

Disclaimer: times were a little different when I was in school 2007-2011, according to lots of friends who teach and coach post-2020.

But first and foremost, it was drilled into us every season that if we missed practices, we wouldn't get to race or travel for meets. Had to be present for AT LEAST 5 practices in a row between meets (when there were at least 5 school days between meets, anyway) to be eligible to race, and also had to carry a certain GPA minimum, which I forget now. Shouldn't most HS teams have policies like these? If you even missed one class during a school day — tardy to first hour, late after lunch, etc — and didn't have a doctor's or parent's note to show for it, you typically wouldn't be allowed to practice that day and it would usually count against your 5-day streak. When there were fewer than 5 days between meets, like with a Tuesday evening dual meet and a larger race that Friday or Saturday, you simply couldn't afford to miss any classes or practices or you'd violate the 5-in-a-row policy and be bumped off the roster for the upcoming race.

There were always exceptions made for medical or scheduling issues (parents couldn't pick you up from practice, car trouble, family trip, etc). The only times he came down hard on a runner who missed practice were when he knew the kid was being lazy and/or lying to him, or when he saw the kid in town when he/she should've been in class or at practice. Tough but fair. Happened once in a while, but very rarely — we were all on the team because we loved running and racing, and took it all seriously.

Half the fun of being a high school athlete was being able to leave class after lunch, get on the bus with your teammates, and go race a few towns away — if that privilege was revoked, it felt like you were losing a lot. Even though I was barely fast enough to crack varsity, it meant everything to me.

Bottom line, we really respected our coach and wanted to do right by our teammates. And we all enjoyed a lot of privileges as cross country runners, plus a little prestige since our team had one of the better records in recent history. Football team lost almost every game, basketball and baseball were mid, etc, but we always went to the state championships and put some runners in the top 10-20 as a rule. We had no problem showing up to practice when it meant being a part of that story.