Katelyn Tuohy’s season over

Deer Runner wrote:

Here is my advice since you appear genuinely interested in addressing this. It might be useless, but if we have enough useless ideas someone may be able to think of something that works. The majority of Let’s Run posters are against unhealthy practices like overtraining young runners, and that is a great and positive resource for over excited kids who might otherwise overtrain. So you need to figure out how to be a positive resource for the other big problem in youth running: anorexia.

1) Given the nature of anorexia and its prevalence in young female distance runners, you have a moral obligation to help fight it. Calling a young female runner overweight is different than someone posting on Lets Play Football that a high school quarterback has a weak arm or on Let’s Play Basketball that a shooting guard is too short or out of shape. It is different because the very act of calling a young woman overweight can actually trigger anorexia. So yes weight is an important part of the sport and you would like to be able to discuss it the way a football fan talks about arms or a basketball fan talks about height, but you can’t. The risk that it places on the target of the comment is too high. So one thing you should consider is eliminating all comments about the weight of any actual female athletes below a certain age, especially if they are based on someone’s “analysis” of a photograph. It’s just not worth the damage it can cause. People can still have a general discussion about weight’s impact on running without mentioning specific young athletes.

2) In virtually any article about a person’s suicide, there is almost always a notice in the article about resources to call if a reader of the article is having suicidal thoughts. I don’t know that such a thing works in this case. But there are certainly lots of links and messages and advice that can be placed in any thread that goes near the weight issue. Lauren Fleshman’s letter to her younger self should be posted all over this thread. A young female runner with a proclivity towards an eating disorder will likely get drawn to threads like this, so use it to reach them and tell them what they need to hear. Instead of having topics like this create risks for young female runners, use your power of control over the message board to bring help. It probably won’t impact much traffic one way or the other, but you might wind up saving a few lives.

3) To the posters, I encourage you to provide as many helpful insights on this topic as possible. Give the right advice and help, and drown out the weirdos who almost seem to get joy in trying to ruin young people’s lives. The young girls need need your help, and you can make a difference.

4) To any young female runner reading this, read Lauren Fleshman’s letter. She has much more useful things to say about this than anything I can write, or any thing virtually all the other posters can write.

rojo wrote:

Hejendo76 wrote:

Yep. Tuohy has shut down her season. Thoughts?

Thought #1. Anytime a teenage woman doesn't PR in a given year, I get VERY, VERY worried. Actually I probably get worried if it's male or female but very worried if it's a woman, and that was certainly the case this year.

lohud wrote:

(At the NY state champs), she ran a 2019 U.S. girls No. 2 time of 9:21.9 at 3,000 meters Friday on the Middletown High School track. But that time was more than 12 seconds slower than what she ran at last year’s state championships.

And while she was the last person on the track Friday night, running warm-down laps, and was there the next morning, running in preparation for the 1,500, she was subsequently scratched from the 1,500.

Tuohy didn’t approach her personal-best of 4:14.45 in the outdoor 1,500 this spring, but her 4:25.21, clocked at the Section 1 state qualifier, is a U.S. No. 3 for high school girls this season.

Thought #2 is it's good they shut it down. I mean she's only going to get discouraged that she's nowhere close to her pbs from last year.

HEre is an article that the quote above comes from:

https://www.lohud.com/story/sports/high-school/track/2019/06/11/track-katelyn-tuohy-miss-nationals-usatf-championships/1421832001/

PS. Anyone know why she pulled from the 1500 of the state meet? That is odd to me.

rojo wrote:

the absolute truth wrote:

The only advice from/about LRC that she or any other young female runner needs comes from Sara Hall:

"Avoid LetsRun like the plague."

This thread is a perfect example of why.

Ok. But Jordan Hasay's dad comes here all the time.

What's your point? I've tried to edit out offensive posts about weight gain but feel like I need to allow the topic of weight be discussed if done in a civil and polite manner. I

f you were coaching a female athlete, how would you approach the important topic of weight?

Yes, I know many coaches just ignore it.

In my mind, the following are all true about weight.

a) weight matters but

b) it's unhealthy as hell to be anorexic.

c) It's uncomfortable as hell to talk about healthy eating/weight but probably does need to be talked about.

So it's hard to balance all three.

LateRunnerPhil wrote:

Some great posts so far.

1) Yes, it is good to end the season early. Things weren't going too well and nothing is gonna magically change in the next weeks, better write it off and focus on next year where she can crush again.

2) Yes, it's good for her long-term development. Getting 2-3 more "bad" races would be very bad mentally for her. Coaches know what they are doing.

3) I don't think the exam have much impact. It's what the other poster said - growth & weight. She gained a lot of weight, which slows her down considerably in anything >800m. She could try to run a 400 or 800m PR at this point, as she is even more muscular now and has more strength.

Most people get worried that it's just another Mary Cain. You need to stop worrying and support her instead, Katy has achieved phenomenal things so far and will keep doing so in the future.