He's 13 years old wrote:
coach t wrote:It is definitely a psychological barrier.
Of the coach, not the kid.
He keeps saying that he can't believe that with a little hard work he is already running the times he runs. He thinks he doesn't deserve it yet.
So what. That has no bearing on his performances, other then he's especially pleased that he keeps exceeding expectations. This is much better than an overbearing psychotic coach who tries to tell him he has mental problems.
He used to tell us after meets how all the kids run so much during the week and do 5ks and two meets a week. He was always playing soccer and goofing around at practice and I think now that he focused, he still feels like he hasn't done enough to earn it.
He's right, but let him be surprised when he exceeds his expectations.
Special thanks to Jaguar and a couple others on here. He was reading through these and called me about five minutes ago and was really excited. He felt like maybe his way is a strategy and that if he picks it up a drop, he can just tail off the front runners and make his move in the middle of the race.
I agree, but ditch the idea of a faster first lap.
I don't like the faster first lap, he does. He said he gets discouraged when at nationals they come out so much quicker. He understands they slow down quite a bit but he wanted to keep touch with them a bit better than what he does regionally because these runners can really move. I tried explaining that his times are great and I love the way he runs, but he says he's afraid it will happen again so he wanted to try and come out quicker. I saw nothing wrong with that based on watching these youth nationals for years and seeing what he means. They all come out much too fast, but it is hard for a kid to get that and see them go out that quickly and stick to his race plan. So we are adjusting to fit his mentality a little better, that's it. Nothing major, just a drop quicker in first half of race. Thank you for calling me psychotic though!