Newbury Park - is it the coach or the kids?

Why don't you think a month at altitude won't have a physiological benefit?

What was the enrollment of your high school?

Isn't that common at most successful programs? Don't they attract kids that want good coaching and a chance to be part of a really good team? he has only been at that school four years, who are these studs that transferred in?

If coaching doesn't matter, why would a stud sub 15:00 CC guy switch schools and spend that extra time driving to this new school?

As a matter of fact, I could provide such examples (although I won't, you can ask Sean or maybe just pay attention). It seems many on this board spend more time grinding their axes than learning and practicing the art of coaching, while that is pretty much all Sean does.

And there are other factors in play. It's never just talent or just coaching. Such success requires support from the school, from administration to superintendent/school boards. It requires a buy-in from the parents and community, in addition to the athletes. How do you get everyone on board? Could you? It's not just giving the kids workouts.

Anyone who says Coach Brosnan is just lucky has no clue, or is just into bashing for personal reasons.

Ghost of Ward Cleaver wrote:

mister chau wrote:

Yeah, ever. Find another school at any time that has ever had that number of studs come to a high school. I’ll wait.

He’s not getting kids at the school to come out for cross, he’s getting kids to come to the school that are already studs.

Isn't that common at most successful programs? Don't they attract kids that want good coaching and a chance to be part of a really good team? he has only been at that school four years, who are these studs that transferred in?

If coaching doesn't matter, why would a stud sub 15:00 CC guy switch schools and spend that extra time driving to this new school?

It’s called recruiting and it’s much easier to name those that didn’t transfer in. The list starts with Appleford and ends with Doshi with nobody in between. The rest have transferred in from other school districts.

Ghost of Ward Cleaver wrote:

SDSU Aztec wrote:

Can you provide a couple of examples of the little things that the NP runners do that resulted in 3 guys beating Ritz's course record? Did Ritz do them as well or would he have run 30 seconds faster had Bronsan been his coach? The month at altitude is undoubtly enjoyable for the kids but won't result in the bros running faster.

Apparently Brosnan has revolutionized distance running training. Is it only a matter of time before other coaches steal his ideas and 50 HS guys in the U.S. run 8:40? What could he accomplish in other sports? The sky is the limit.

Why don't you think a month at altitude won't have a physiological benefit?

What was the enrollment of your high school?

I've read that if there is a physiological benefit, it's gone within 2 weeks of returning to sea level. And it's only a month anyway.

That was a long time ago. Almost 2,000? We were in the large-school division.

It's mostly the talent of the kids and the coach not screwing them up. He got lucky getting two sets of brothers of immense talent. And he's doing a good job of not ruining them. I coach high school and have had a number of national caliber kids that really make the staff look like amazing coaches but in reality, we just caught lightning in a bottle and rode the wave. Majority of our athletes are regular kids that we just try to keep improving and enjoying the sport.

"Such success requires support from the school, from administration to superintendent/school boards. It requires a buy-in from the parents and community..."

Nonsense. The vast majority of great runners or athletes in any sport have none of that.

Many posters are obsessed with coaching and Brosnan having possibly the three best HS runners in the country, plus Nico, makes him the GOAT coach.

If German had equally talented twin brothers a year behind him,would his coach have curled up in a fetal position or would he, uh, have had them train together and all break 8:40?

Both. I takes a good athlete but also good guidance.

A friend of mine was an amazing HS runner decades ago he went to college and got burned out cuz stupid coach ignored him he was always trying to matched w/o’s from much seasoned older guys. It was so severe that he developed chronic fatigue syndrome and gave up running.

a lot of input from a bunch of people that have no clue what it is like to coach a team much less a successful one.

Without a great tram culture this doesn’t happen. Yep, these guys are talented but they would be running 15’s for a poorly coached program.

There are also tremendous challenges when your team is successful. Everyone wants a piece of it and if you are not careful they will take it away from you. I have been through that when my athletes start running fast times. Clubs, other parents, other coaches are all somehow trying to get involved and pull the kids away. It’s not easy.

kjhyyghh wrote:

Does anybody know if there are any talented kids from the feeder programs that will come to NP in the next 2 years?

Found this

Rome was not built in one day

Are you kidding? Even for men, soccer is much more popular than XC. XC is the invisible sport that half of the team participates in to get more fit for whatever team sport they care more about.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

"Such success requires support from the school, from administration to superintendent/school boards. It requires a buy-in from the parents and community..."

Nonsense. The vast majority of great runners or athletes in any sport have none of that.

Many posters are obsessed with coaching and Brosnan having possibly the three best HS runners in the country, plus Nico, makes him the GOAT coach.

If German had equally talented twin brothers a year behind him,would his coach have curled up in a fetal position or would he, uh, have had them train together and all break 8:40?

1) The dispute here is not about great runners or athletes individually in any sport - it's about great cross-country teams. To have a great team year after year does require those things. Individual greatness can occur anywhere, but great teams don't just spontaneously arise and sustain themselves.

2) The GOAT argument is just stupid. You say that many posters (obsessed with coaching?) consider Brosnan the GOAT coach. How many? Do you not realize that many posters here are merely trolls? It's absolutely legitimate to consider NP 2021 the GOAT team - lots of metrics to support that. Coaching, though, is much more subjective and must include a longer time frame. Think Joe Newton. Brosnan is a very good, successful coach. Tom Brady wasn't the GOAT after his fourth year in the NFL, but he is now. Let's see how NP does over the next few years. I think they'll do just fine.

SDSU Aztec wrote:

Ghost of Ward Cleaver wrote:

Why don't you think a month at altitude won't have a physiological benefit?

What was the enrollment of your high school?

I've read that if there is a physiological benefit, it's gone within 2 weeks of returning to sea level. And it's only a month anyway.

That was a long time ago. Almost 2,000? We were in the large-school division.

What's gone in two weeks?

You really don't think there was ever a potential 9:00 3200m runner in your school. Do you recall your school records for 800, 1600, and 3200?

My school records are 1:55-4:31-9:39

To the folks saying that Brosnan has revolutionized training...get a grip on reality. They train really hard, and clearly he's found a system that works for very talented individuals and has found methods to keep them healthy and motivated, which is really the hardest part of coaching.

Take kids that talented and have them basically racing 4 mile tempos all summer, run race pace workouts year round, do some sprinting, long run, etc. keep them healthy, and yeah it's not surprising to see the result.

I know many programs that train in similar fashions that have had a lot of success, but it seems to be a perfect storm of hard training, timing of having these two families together at once and a motivating coach.

Is he going to get a pro coaching gig after these kids graduate? Nico will be ready to go pro by then.

BI-Den wrote:

Is he going to get a pro coaching gig after these kids graduate? Nico will be ready to go pro by then.

That might be a good fit for him.

It's mostly having talented runners and the coach is smart enough to not screw them up. Since the dawn of LR there has always been a small percentage of guys that post on here that refuse to even acknowledge the role genetics have in an athlete's top end abilities. These are the same guys that seem to think the only difference between them and the top athletes in our country is finding the right training plan/ coach.

Here's the thing, it wasn't your coach that kept you from being an Olympian, it was your parents.

Han Solo wrote:

To the folks saying that Brosnan has revolutionized training...get a grip on reality. They train really hard, and clearly he's found a system that works for very talented individuals and has found methods to keep them healthy and motivated, which is really the hardest part of coaching.

Take kids that talented and have them basically racing 4 mile tempos all summer, run race pace workouts year round, do some sprinting, long run, etc. keep them healthy, and yeah it's not surprising to see the result.

I know many programs that train in similar fashions that have had a lot of success, but it seems to be a perfect storm of hard training, timing of having these two families together at once and a motivating coach.

Yeah, why hasn’t the same training had the effect on the current freshman class like it did on the 2019 freshman class? The same coach, assuming the same training, yet one class averaged 15:17 as freshman and the other class had an average PR of 19:07 for the top 5. So, the same coach is a world beater with the 2019 freshman class, but not with with the 2021 class? It’s the kids, not the coach.