Bill: Thanks for posting on here. I've been trying to follow your coaching methods since Alex Hatz was running for you. The talk in NC was great for helping me understanding youth psychology which is just as important as the training itself. Will you be speaking in the south again anytime soon?
bill aris wrote:
i would say that a more realistic connection, and which is utilized to some degree with my 7th and 8th grade runners in middle school, would be percy's 'schoolboy athletics'.
I guess this statement clears up any confusion as to whether 7th and 8th graders are part of the FM program and under the overall supervision of Bill Aris.
caiado wrote:
Bill: Thanks for posting on here. I've been trying to follow your coaching methods since Alex Hatz was running for you. The talk in NC was great for helping me understanding youth psychology which is just as important as the training itself. Will you be speaking in the south again anytime soon?
What ever happened to Alex Hatz and many of the other top runners at FM?
Why don't they continue to develop?
Can you also provide an update on the status of every child who has played lacrosse, baseball, football and basketball at F-M over the last 10 years? I would like to attack all of those student athletes who did not move up to have successful D-1 and pro careers!
If they have not lived up to MY expectations on how the rest of their lives have turned out, they are abject failures!
On second thought, that sounds absolutely stupid.
I guess that logic only makes sense when it is applied to children that run. Yes, that's it!! Only children that run should be expected to focus on the sport of their youth for an infinite period. Only children that run should be expected improve in a perfectly linear fashion until they live up to MY expectations for them.
LRC troll wrote:
Can you also provide an update on the status of every child who has played lacrosse, baseball, football and basketball at F-M over the last 10 years? I would like to attack all of those student athletes who did not move up to have successful D-1 and pro careers!
If they have not lived up to MY expectations on how the rest of their lives have turned out, they are abject failures!
On second thought, that sounds absolutely stupid.
I guess that logic only makes sense when it is applied to children that run. Yes, that's it!! Only children that run should be expected to focus on the sport of their youth for an infinite period. Only children that run should be expected improve in a perfectly linear fashion until they live up to MY expectations for them.
No, But it would be expected that one or two of these kids from this wonderful program would continue to develop, not asking alot, no need for you to jump to any conclusions or jump to defend the program, just answer the effing question and shut the eff up.
I was at the clinic at Villanova and had the pleasure to listen to Bill Aris. However, I disagree with the statement that he gave the nuts and bolts to the training, the specifics of what the OP is looking for. It was more about developing the entire student-athlete.
Most of the questions asked by coaches were about the specifics of FMs weight training - about 10 q's on the dead lift alone. I found it funny that so much interest was being placed on this one small detail of FM's training. Like they had found the magic bullet and if we all went home and had our kids dead lift like FM they would run just as fast.
Even if you were given the training logs of the FM athletes, and all you did as a coach was replicate it, you would not have the same success. The lifestyle and commitment that he gets from an athlete at this age goes a long, long way. Look at the diet of your typical teenage runners and start there, I'm guessing FM's bus is not stopping for fast food on the way home.
Good luck to the Aris's and the FM runners at NXN regionals tomorrow.
Diet isn't as important as you think. Sure, eating healthy will help, but there are a lot of great runners who train like animals and eat like crap. Don't think that diet is the "magic bullet" either. It's the TRAINING! If you get 10-15 high school boys to run 8-10 miles a day all summer, you will have a KILLER cross country team, no matter what they're eating. But how many schools actually accomplish this? Very, very few.
asdfafasdfa wrote:
Diet isn't as important as you think. Sure, eating healthy will help, but there are a lot of great runners who train like animals and eat like crap. Don't think that diet is the "magic bullet" either. It's the TRAINING! If you get 10-15 high school boys to run 8-10 miles a day all summer, you will have a KILLER cross country team, no matter what they're eating. But how many schools actually accomplish this? Very, very few.
It's not just the 8-10 miles a day. Like one of the former runners said, it's the 40 mile runs, the 50 x 500, the 100 hills, this is like a cult. There is a reason that you never get a direct answer to the actual training question.
Looks like FM girls are still rolling - although it looks like Kinetic and North Shore put up heck of a fight. And Jillian Fanning is having one heck of a season. I think she's undefeated so far (?)
http://www.runnerspace.com/eprofile.php?event_id=299&do=news&news_id=22202
1. 43 Manlius XC-NY (18:51.3 94:16.5 1:39.6) =============================================
1 1 Jillian Fanning JR 17:47.4
2 4 Katie Sischo SR 18:45.7
3 5 Hanna Smith JR 18:50.9
4 16 Alana Pearl SO 19:25.5
5 17 Katie Brislin JR 19:27.0
6 ( 22) Jenna Farrell 8 19:37.0
7 ( 29) Annika Avery FR 19:55.4 2.
57 Kinetic RC-NY (19:10.8 95:54.0 0:36.6) =============================================
1 7 Taylor Driscoll JR 18:54.2
2 9 Keelin Hollowood SR 19:06.4
3 10 Estela Smith FR 19:06.4
4 13 Olivia Morrow 8 19:16.2
5 18 Tara Peck SR 19:30.8
6 ( 24) Katie Treichel SR 19:38.0
7 ( 28) Maggi Szpak SR 19:53.4
3. 87 North Shore Running Club (19:09.0 95:44.9 2:41.3) =============================================
1 2 Samantha Nadel SR 18:14.7
2 3 Brianna Nerud SR 18:26.3
3 6 Jessica Donohue JR 18:51.8
4 12 Elizabeth Caldwell JR 19:16.1
5 64 Alexandra Osman SO 20:56.0
6 ( 76) Monica Morra 8 21:24.0
7 ( 84) Olivia Statile SO 22:01.0
FM boys got second.
1. 78 Shaker T+F Club-NY (16:39.3 83:16.2 1:15.5) =============================================
1 2 Mike Libruk SR 16:03.8
2 6 Christian Delago SR 16:23.3
3 13 Jon Vallecorsa SR 16:41.8
4 15 Ethan Hausamann SR 16:48.0
5 42 Ryan Recchia SR 17:19.3
6 ( 45) Adam Schwenzfeier JR 17:21.2
7 ( 61) Max Morgan JR 17:48.3
2. 93 Manlius XC-NY (16:41.6 83:27.7 1:09.8) =============================================
1 1 Nick Ryan JR 15:59.1
2 5 Matt Deyo SR 16:15.6
3 22 Ben Thomas SR 16:58.8
4 31 Colin Fitzgibbons JR 17:05.3
5 34 Connor Farrell JR 17:08.9
6 ( 63) Bryce Millar FR 17:52.9
7 ( 84) Mike Malone SR 18:18.5
wake up people wrote:
asdfafasdfa wrote:Diet isn't as important as you think. Sure, eating healthy will help, but there are a lot of great runners who train like animals and eat like crap. Don't think that diet is the "magic bullet" either. It's the TRAINING! If you get 10-15 high school boys to run 8-10 miles a day all summer, you will have a KILLER cross country team, no matter what they're eating. But how many schools actually accomplish this? Very, very few.
It's not just the 8-10 miles a day. Like one of the former runners said, it's the 40 mile runs, the 50 x 500, the 100 hills, this is like a cult. There is a reason that you never get a direct answer to the actual training question.
I would think they would be much better if their Varsity was actually running that mileage...
May actually be the closest 'Toga has been to FM in a while...
and North Shore is really hurting for a fifth runner
Saratoga definitely gave them a battle. I was standing at about 2.5 and 'toga's 4-6 were ahead of F-M's 4th and 'toga's 7th was about 4 seconds behind her. At that point the team score was almost a dead heat by my reckoning.
Uncle Percy wrote:
The secretive nature of FM's program seems to fly in the face of Percy Cerutty's approach, which was to share knowledge and raise the level of the sport. Cerutty was noted for his speaking engagements, large group demonstrations, and promotion of his philosophies--including the specifics of his training programs.
I am not insinuating that there is some sort of sinister plan at work here. I just find it odd that FM calls themselves Stotans but fail to operate in the spirit of the creator of the approach.
You don't get it. You need to understand that it is a total holistic approach. It is a complete lifestyle and attitude change and re-inventing of the runner. You have to get the kids to buy-in with charismatic speeches. You need to work on core strength, weight training, diet, sleep, stretching, cross-training and the complete psychological approach - believing in yourself, visualizing success, believing in your coach, believing in your teammates, working together as a cohesive symbiotic organism. It is a life style changing metamorphous of tying in all the possible elements affecting the physical and mental state of the runner and carefully bringing this all together into an individualized and team program. This is what makes a dynastic championship program. What they actually do for running varies from person to person and from season to season so the details of the actual running training is secondary and practically irrelevant so the details don't matter. If you are searching for the actual running stuff, you are missing the point of the totality of the approach to holistic training and you are not realizing how important the big picture is.
I am just kidding of course. In all serious Bill is obviously a legendary coach and should be admired and respected for his accomplishments and his dedication to his kids. He has obviously decided he isn't going to share anything other than fluff like I wrote about and that is his right to do.
I have a kid currently running for another perennial NXN finals qualifier on the girls side.
While my kid's team is solid and the coach does a great job all things considered, I know that the kids do not embrace the total lifestyle to the degree described in this thread. I think that is the main difference, especially since my kid's team sends plenty of girls to D1 programs, some of whom have become extremely good (national class) runners.
Having seen my kid's team for a few years now, and knowing plenty of the kids on the team, I know for a fact that these kids don't embrace the holistic plan described here. They eat junk food, stay up and out late, have boyfriends, and train less religiously. Their training is decent, but not as good year-round and they certainly don't hit the weights as hard. Their diet is decent, but not great. The coach is committed, but takes the summer off and has other interests. In sum, at the HS level these add up to main the differences between a girl running 18 flat and 19 flat. Obviously the real talented HS kids are running under 18, but FM is not getting a radically different gene pool. FM is winning because they are getting these girls who at another school would run 19 to run sub 18.
You can't argue with results however I do question the complete immersion or running monk lifestyle for teenagers. Not that I necessarily disagree with it either, but it isn't for everyone. Especially since a girl that can run 17:30 in HS really isn't guaranteed to be crap on the next level and some burn out really early. 17:30 is about D2 All American level, but certainly nowhere near pro, so it isn't like Aris has got Iten West going. He is clearly great at maximizing HS talent. What that is really worth is up to each person to decide.
Yes, I've heard Aris be described as a "control freak" when it comes to the lives of his runners. I, too, am concerned that the "holistic lifestyle" stuff jokingly posted by wiseguy33 (which I actually took seriously until I saw the second post) leads to, like you said, a "monk's life" for a high school kid. Sure, maybe the Alberto Salazar approach (controlling every minute of an athlete's life) can squeeze the most talent out of a kid, but is that right for a HIGH SCHOOL KID? I hope not. High school girls are SUPPOSED to have boyfriends, they're SUPPOSED to eat junk food once in a while, and they're SUPPOSED to go out and have fun with their friends. Not sit at home on Saturday nights munching on kale and doing a core routine. I think the real trick is to get kids to have a diet and sleep schedule that's "good enough" to allow them to train well, but also flexible enough for them to have fun and be a KID at the same time (all while doing the running every day of course!). Running doesn't have to be an all-day obsession. Plenty of great high school runners are pretty normal kids, they just happen to run 8-11 miles a day.
This is the closest any team has come to FM since 06.
dasdfsadffsda wrote:
...High school girls are SUPPOSED to have boyfriends, they're SUPPOSED to eat junk food once in a while, and they're SUPPOSED to go out and have fun with their friends. Not sit at home on Saturday nights munching on kale and doing a core routine.
That's so ridiculous. Who says that's what high school girls are SUPPOSED to do? I can't think of anything better than learning discipline and the importance of hard work at an early age. That makes relationships, friendships and career goals so much easier and more meaningful later in life.
And why is all of this structure and hard work criticism typically only aimed at the girls team?
core work, weight training, diet, sleep, cross-training, visualization, team bonding, believing in one's self, believing in your coach, believing in your team, a holistic appoach, bying into a program, "the lifestyle" etc
all add up to 1% of race performance
what you did for actual running the previous 3-5 years
adds up to 99% of race performance
Bill will talk for hours to you all about the 1%, but won't talk about the 99% at all. Again, that is his right to do. He may have his reasons, he doesn't want to give his advantage away, he may not want to open himself up to criticism, he may be afraid people will accuse him of making his kids do too much or he may inexplicably not have confidence in what he is doing despite his legendary success.
looks like saratoga could potentially be the best in the country if they hadn't lost macdonald and carr...