I sent an email to a coach about walking on 6 weeks ago, no reply, what do I do now?

The coach didn't respond because he doesn't want you. As a coach of a D-1 program, you would be surprised at how many people you get who think they are good enough to be on the team and think they can walk on. It all depends on the school, but I am pretty confident in saying that they likely can't take walk-ons because they already have a ton of guys on the team who are faster than you and can't add any more because of Title IX. It's easy to get a whole bunch of guys who want to keep running in college vs. women who do. So, a lot of teams need to keep their men's #s down and have a ton of talent already on the team and can't take someone who says "oh, I will be much better in college" - they ALL say that! I am guessing you haven't posted your times because they are really not good at all. If you want any chance at all at being on the team you need to meet with the coach face-to-face, an email or phone call isn't going to cut it. They just get too many of those and are easily ignored. Many coaches aren't in the office much over the summer either - again, depends on the program. At our school, coaches are here maybe 3 hours a day over the summer. You would need to set up a time to meet with the coach if you wanted to actually meet with them - but the trouble will be in getting the coach to actually meet with you. If you can't do that, then they definitely don't want you. Go to a Division III school - I can almost guarantee any of them would give you a shot! There are also some small Division I and II programs that would gladly take anyone. Find a place where they actually want you - otherwise train for road races and be happy with that!

Here's my story:

16:30 guy and 9:45 3200 runner in HS. Walked onto a D1 team, but had put 85 to 100 mile weeks the summer before my freshman year because I wanted to do my best.

Ran between 90 and 110 miles a week during my freshman year.

Sophomore year did great and got a full ride.

By the time I was a junior I was one of the best in the region.

Go for it, but be prepared to work INCREDIBLY HARD. Understand that you will have to work harder and put in more miles than guys who have talent.

Some guys could go out Saturday night and drink, get up and run 12 mile long run and be competitive. That was NOT me. Be prepared for a massive amount of work and sacrifice.

Honestly, I did not have much of a vibrant or typical college social life but I have memories of outkicking 28 minute 10k guys in cross, getting a full ride and loads of awards/honors.

Also understand that you will see why the coach won't reply to you. While on the team, we had about 20 walk ons who would show up, half ass it and quit.

I had a positive experience walking on in college in the late 90's. My academics gave me the option of getting a full-ride anywhere I wanted and I ended up choosing BYU. I thought my times in high school were fast (1:59, 4:31, 9:50, !5:50--fast enough to be all-state in the middle classification of Utah) but obviously they weren't anything special, but I'll still think they were solid given the low mileage I logged in training. When I went on an academic recruiting trip to BYU, I made it a point to go see the XC coach and tell him I wanted to run. He was nice, but not that interested. At one point he mentioned a runner from a rival high school that he had but trying to recruit....I mentioned that I beat this other runner as often as he beat me. This got the coach somewhat interested and the coach allowed me to sign up for the PE class the XC registered for credit. He helped me with the NCAA clearinghouse, etc. I trained hard the summer before BYU, but still was way behind the curve when fall practices started. I thought 40 mpw was a lot...........but it wasn't. Sometimes I had to skip my morning runs just so that I could put enough effort into keeping up in the afternoon practices. I improved and ran a 4:20 mile in a time trial before winter break--which was a big breakthrough for me.

After 1 semester of college I left BYU to go on a Mormon mission. I did not run during the 2 years I was on my mission and came back out of shape. To make things worse, Coach James had retired and was replaced by Ed Eyestone. Coach Eyestone didn't have a clue who I was when I went to see him about rejoining the team. He agreed to let me try back out for the team in the fall (about 6 months out). Long story short, I got injured before fall trying to get back into shape and ended up getting consumed by my school work to the point where I didn't have time to try and run once I was healthy. Looking back, I'm glad I gave it a shot and was able to recognize that I had more talent than my HS times showed........but on the other hand, I never could have kept up academically if I had been running 80 miles a week. My hat is off to those of you who juggled everything.

genius wrote:

Look up the team's roster. Find the team members on Facebook and add them. They will be able to lead you in the right direction.

This is actually a brilliant suggestion; back in the old school days, coaches did not ignore snail mail, if nothing else they dictated something to their sexytary...