Notre Dame has its new distance coach - Chris Neal from Furman

Spending time "Making distance runners better athletes" is definitely not the best philosophy of all time in my opinion

Interesting hire to take a guy that has never run the show from what is probably the most underachieving distance running school in the nation

Think of "making better athletes" as cross-training for overall strength and flexibility and it makes a lot of sense. He discusses going in the pool, kettle bell and medicine ball workouts, etc. Threshold training sounds like his bread and better. As we know, distance runners usually don't tear achilles or MCLs, they get repetitive stress injuries. Cross-training gets away from pounding on the track or on the roads and builds complementary muscles. When I ran (at ND) I wish we had practiced yoga and cross-training, etc. I never made it through a year without having to take time off for injuries or illness. After I left school and was working full-time, I ran a few more years. I had to cut down my training and miles but started practicing yoga and it made a huge difference in my running. I was hitting times I ran in college with about 60-70% of the mileage and training time. Furman is a smaller (3000 undergrads or so) academic school so Neal is probably already familiar with the kind of student athlete ND wants. Neal is more established than Sean Carlson was when he started coaching at ND, but it seems like the usual ND hire - someone promising and enthusiastic who they don't have to pay a lot of money!

It is a fine line between doing enough to help performance and doing too much so you are wasting time and energy. Without knowing what he is pushing it is hard to comment on.

"Furman College is widely known as one of the NCAA's dynasties"

What a misstatement !! Did their men or women score any distance points at the NCAA Outdoors ??

My take on Furman, Neal has been taking above average runners and making them good runners...

They're the best team in the nation

At coming 26-30th at NCAAs with unlimited resources

Great! Now ND can have a reputation for harassing high schoolers into going there… Just like Furman. Maybe they can throw in some eating disorders, too.

Going to have a dope Instagram game though

Strange to hire the 3rd guy on the totem pole at Furman. It's uncertain if Neal actually wrote any workouts for the team.

Furman actually underachieved considering they have 5 distance coaches and put 12 scholarships into distance. But then again, Notre Dame also underachieved with Carlson (except 1 XC season in a COVID year) compared to the talent they get.

If Chris Neal was 3rd down the chart he shouldn't be blamed for the lack of performance of Furman. That wouldn't fall on Rob Gary, no? They get very good runners and some run well. Some do not. It was the same case at Ohio State. Taking very talented runners having a few run alright.

Or Chris Neal wrote the workouts for the college guys and would deserve credit for the few who ran well. Chris would also get some blame for the under performance.

IMO you can't say he's a terd coach and say he wasn't writing workouts.

2 national champions in 3 years, 3 straight top 10 national XC meet finishes, 3 ACC xc titles. 4 men in the 10k at nationals this year. underachieved?

Coach Neal is going to be a wonderful addition to the ND squad. Don’t lump him in with some of the other Furman coaches who still have some learning to do on how to treat people— he is one of the good ones and is getting out to do just that: be a good coach and turn athletes into good athletes.

Notre Dame is a relatively easy place to recruit to. Their AD insists on high character coaches. Hope they do well.

how does furman coaches treat hs athletes?

Oh man, remember those idiots who thought Sean Brosnan was getting hired at ND?

He was holding out for the Oregon job.

After the last NP altitude camp video where he was begging for a college to take a chance on him, I’m sure the job offers are pouring in.

Chris Neal is the only decent human being on the Furman coaching staff. He deserves this position more than anyone. Surprised he didn't leave sooner.