UO women track athletes alleging they felt victimized by the program's data-driven approach to weight and body fat percentage

Yikes Yikes Yikes wrote:

That's not good. Hopefully this article ends the practice, but Johnson comes out looking pretty terrible.

“Track is nothing but numbers,” he says. “A good mathematician probably could be a good track coach.”

I'd argue the opposite. Pretty much anyone with a background in running could come up with a decent training plan, but what separates good coaches are their abilities to support and inspire athletes.

No dude. The best coaches don't ever coach athletes who aren't already sufficiently inspired.

progressive regressive wrote:

This article is nothing but a one sided, slanderous and even racist attack. They only talk to one person that sides with the coaches? On a team with 100 people and 5 transfer out, the article makes it seem like the 5% is the majority but it's actually a miniscule tiny fraction and the vast majority have no issue at all.

Where is the limit as to what coaches can say? Can they say don't eat fried food? Or is that going to give eating disorders as well? Or if the team is at Olive Garden the night before the NCAA championships and the coach says no desserts, is that fat shaming?

Hoepfully rojo will be able to keep his job

oregon juice wrote:

sleazazar wrote:

Oregon doing something slimy? I'm shocked.

How do they ever lose a meet? Worst coaching ever - they do the least with the most. Best dope, highest paid runners, no corner too small to cut, no area ever too gray, every championship meet a home meet.

Agreed! U of O has all the ingredients plus 10x more. The only ingredient they don’t have? Expert coaching. DEXA scanning is not coaching.

Athletes will go to war with an expert coach. They can overcome impossible odds to win! That expert does it all: recruits, analyzes, teaches, strategizes, communicates, motivates, and inspires. Expert coaches avoid negativity. When U of O literally Has It All, that nonsense is embarrassing.

Expert coaches win despite limited resources. Not fully funded, no indoor facilities, no trails, horrible weather, impossibly high admission standards, expensive tuition, prohibitively expensive city (for hiring assistant coaches), niche school, D2, D3, NAIA, no regulation track, hostile administration…?Expert coaches still build winning programs despite these kinds of handicaps.

“After her first DEXA scan, the nutritionist told her she couldn’t travel to away track meets unless her body fat level was below 12%.” Wow forget using actual performance times. What was Pre’s body fat percentage again?

Good reporting by Ken Goe.

Imagine women in an East African training camp complaining about having to lose weight... and some still wonder why Americans will never be competitive?!

Lol. Coaches making 10 million. Alabama spends 75 million on football. Regardless, you cannoy be fat and run well. End.of story.

Anyone care to argue the contrary of this?? And if so how

albertsaladbar wrote:

Maybe a little extreme but these athletes know what they signed up for and honestly I wish my university was this serious. You go to a competitive power 5 school to win titles, not to play paddy cake. If you’re not serious then leave, but for some athletes this is what all that hard work in high school was for, a professional college atmosphere.

Yes.

If I were a competitive female I would be embarrassed by these girls constantly complaining and acting like any time they are asked to be held accountable they scream "abuse".

If you can't deal with it, I'm positive there's a girl in Kenya that will gladly take your place.

I cannot imagine trying to coach HS or Collegiate women in the current environment.

Weight HA just a number WE care about YOU the WHOLE you! Some come here on a full scholarship, sure maybe you're 5'3 165 female, but by golly I bet you really try hard! And it's that why we're all really here running D1 T&F right??

Yikes Yikes Yikes wrote:

“Track is nothing but numbers,” he says. “A good mathematician probably could be a good track coach.”

I'd argue the opposite.

Which is why you will never have the success that Oregon has

Manbearpig15 wrote:

ianove wrote:

LOL really? Oregon is not Harvard, bud.

I'm not your bud, pal.

No sh!t it's not Harvard. We're talking about track not academics.

LOL imagine thinking Harvard is the only school worthy of accepting a full ride offer. I'll take a free ride to Oregon

burnout factory wrote:

You are the foolish one. These women tell their coach they want to be pro athletes, they want to break records and win gold medals. They tell their coach they want his help to reach their full potential and be the best ever. the coach promises he'll do everything he can for them.

Maybe the individual does have pro potential but their weight is holding them back. If you are the coach, do you shut up and let that athlete fall short of the goals that she set and that you promised you'd help her attain? Or do you keep your promise and have the weight conversation?

this is the best post in the thread.

Uh...Put on your "big girl panties' and leave the program if you don't like it...

What happened to strong Women?

“It’s what you signed up for”

Athletes sign a lot of papers when they commit to running, throwing or jumping for college. They quite literally spend the first week signing papers; Compliance, Team Rules and Expectations, (formerly) NIL Agreements, Physical Evaluations, gambling agreements. Nowhere do they sign away any ownership of their body or how they choose to live their lives outside of their pursuit of athletic excellence.

Sure there may have to be nominal, HEALTHY sacrifices, (eating a balanced diet, working out alot!) but the idea that athletes are expected to strike a degree of unbalance that they are missing periods? Backwards.

Athletes are playing a game. They are playing a game for a host of important reasons; personal growth, academic scholarship for overpriced education, fun? They do not owe anyone anything beyond appreciation for the resources and time spent to allow them to pursue these goals. By no means do they owe being pushed even in the direction of discomfort around their size.

(Btw Our views on how athletes should commit themselves are not unlike our understanding of how we are expected to be latched at the hip to our professions. An expectation that because we chose to engage in some kind of work that our whole person is indebted to that pursuit. An antiquated belief that our value is somehow attached to our achievement in a single (often fiscally measurable) contribution to Work. )

Folks who are insisting that athletes uncomfortable with the idea of losing weight shouldn't have gone to Oregon demonstrate a lack of understanding of the factors and outcomes that define success at a high level. Beyond that they fail to understand the fact that Robert Johnson’s power does not exist if we all remember, and he remembers, that he serves the singular function of allowing athletes to stand on his shoulders.

"Mileage plays a role in performance, can we not monitor, coach, advise that? How about pace? How about race strategy? How about running technique? None of them ALONE predict performance, should we not address them? Can we time practice reps? Or does knowing there will be a stop watch at practice cause anxiety?

How about grades? Shall we not get grade reports? And if grades are below standard, shall we not comment, coach, mentor, teach? I'm guessing the 2.0 student gets anxiety every time a mid term report occurs. That meeting with the academic advisor or coach must be harmful to their mental health because they are not prepared to hear facts as they pertain to themselves."

-- This is a great argument because all the things listed here account for 98% of performance and not ONE of them has the STUDIED potential lead to eating disorders, higher rates of suicide, and REDS. Monitored body composition contributes to POTENTIAL increase in performance and a PROBABLE increase in declined overall health. It's just not worth it and any coach that thinks it is is not coaching the whole person, they are coaching numbers.

Interesting article to read. Especially the comments from Vinjamuri and her positive approach about how they tested body fat and why. I'm curios to hear from the male athletes that went through the program and body fat testing. What's they're perspective? Did they get tested? Was there discussion about their body fat size or shape? How did they feel about the testing methods?

Kvothe wrote:

College sports are not pro sports and should not be treated as such, even for athletes who could go pro. If the athletes want to train like pros that is on them. Things like weight, goals, performance should be individualized and set by the athlete. Good on these athletes for sticking up for themselves. The coaches should have treated it like a college sport and not like they're going to win the olympics.

I saw this post & am going to hope every other post looks something like this & that none of them victim blame women or go to bat for college administrators/coaches in positions of power who are focused on staying in those positions. College athletes are intense people who can be guided into unhealthy habits by coaches who see them as nothing more than scorers or non-scorers at their conference meet. I'm glad these athletes came forward. The reality is that this happens at so many more places. Only a small percentage of college athletes are going to go pro. Teach athletes healthy eating habits, fine, but don't jam data down their throats & pressure them to make a certain weight. The extra cross training is public humiliation. Just think about what that does to the mental of someone forced into that situation. If you're doing the training & eating decently well then results will come.

There is a huge difference between acknowledging that body composition is a factor in athletic performance and performing periodic DEXA scans to make a certain body fat % a target as opposed to a result. Seems like most Oregon defenders are couching this as the former which is intellectually dishonest.