Flagpole wrote:
There is no typical middle school times when it comes to looking at a 9:00 3200 kid. 9:00 guys come from all over the place.
Also, a growth spurt might not actually help. A 95 pound kid who is 5'4" in 8th grade could EASILY shoot up to 6'4" or taller. That's not necessarily a good thing for a distance runner.
It's not standing out that's the problem. It's the helicopter parent, the freshman kid who will think he's all that when he has accomplished nothing yet, the other kids on the team who might think he thinks he's better than them (and he might not be).
Stand out by running faster than everyone else, not by having some private coach who may or may not know anything anyway.
The high school coach seems to agree she doesn't know much.
I'll provide better info than she can, and I'll do it for free right now.
1) His mileage was low in middle school (but actually more than some middle school programs I know of). I don't know if the dad mentioned what he's running now mid-summer, but for a kid who WANTS to be good, he should be running 45 MPW by end of summer freshman year and then 40 in season. Build up to 50 in the winter and down to 45 for spring track season. Then get up to 60 before sophomore season. 70 before junior season, and then anything over 70 before senior season is based on lots of things...how injury prone is he...how much is he willing to do...how good is he at that point.
2) Dad should stay out of it other than to be supportive.
3) Kid should get new training shoes every 500 miles MAX...sooner if there are little injuries.
4) In season CC, during a week with a meet on Saturday, there should be one mid-week workout. The rest of the week should be straight distance runs.
5) He should do a long run on Sunday. 8-10 miles as a freshman, and up from there.
6) He should cool down with at least a 3 mile run after the race on meet day.
7) He should eat healthy meals and get 8-10 hours of sleep a night.
8) He should drink a lot of water. There is really no reason to drink anything but water.
9) NO scheduled days off until the season is over. Fridays before a meet should be a light day...consider that the day off.
10) When the season is over, take 3 days off MAX before starting up again preparing for spring track. None of this 2 weeks off stuff that some kids do. Even better, do a run, day off, run, day off, run, day off thing after the season and then start running again every day.
11) Even though both of my kids had practice twice a day on some days in high school, and they both did well, I am not a fan of that for the most part. If the school does that, then the kid should do it, but if not, I'm not into introducing doubles until a runner is over 70 MPW. High school IS more than just running after all. Over 70 MPW, it would be time to introduce a couple of doubles per week.
There.
Even better- avoid doing most of this crap advice. 70 + mpw in HS haha dumb.