Great Oak program under Doug Soles shredded by Runners World

Letsrun every time there’s a young female phenomenon: she’ll burn out! She’s over trained! She’s anorexic! She’ll be injured! Her career will be over before college, etc.!

Letsrun the second a young female talks about the pressures and abuses that lead to burnout, injury and eating disorders: stop whining! What a snowflake! Shut up and run! Suck it up! Tired of hearing about this!

When does a coach get 100% of his athletes to like him/her? When? And it's been a long time since Runners' World was a reputable source for running. Maybe the 80s? I remember in the 90s they were laughed at for running the same articles rewritten every 6-8 months. Now they are playing the GOSSIP game which effectively makes them a step below prostitution. Seriously, if I want to find out how to coach a cross country team, it will not be the last place I go, because I would quit searching for advice before I resorted to that. I hope they keep this crap up and get sued and yes that could happen.

coaching girls/women is a dangerous path. coach them to great success and you will accused of being "Abusive". coaches have to push you and get you to get more out of yourself than you ever thought possible. that is rarely possible by just being someone's cheerleader. they need to be challenged.

you cant make someone great just by telling them everything they do is awesome.

so their going to get sued because girls who ran for the program in the past are speaking about injuries they still have because of HS sports? These women seem to be reflecting on their experiences. It's ok that other athletes had positive experiences, it doesn't negate the injuries these athletes have.

I know nothing about this person, but if it was "super well written/researched" how can any of the claims be far fetched? Those are at odds with each other.

Are you aware of how many high school female soccer players are a bag of injuries after they graduate? Basketball players? Yes...even softball players. So let's not make it sound like this only happens on Soles's XC team. If you wanna play at a high level, people need to take responsibility for it. I'm sick of hearing this stuff. It's like people who smoke and then wanna sue the tobacco company. I'm only saying if Runner's World prints this article...they are responsible for it so it better be true. If not, they are open to lawsuits.

From what I've seen and read, he's an exceptional coach, but kind of a bad guy. Not so bad that I would rule out running for him or having my kids run for him, though. In other words, he's a good enough coach to make that a tough call.

Well when he had this parent problem and he left Great Oak, many of his former athletes, current athletes, parents from both the present and past, and coaches showed support for this BAD guy. Rich Gonzalez had a pretty good write up on him. Let's talk the customer base at Great Oak High School. For Temecula, there is money and to much parent involvement and I would NEVER coach there. Typical modern coaching situations where parents try and gas light you to get what they want and you are pinned as a bad guy for refusing to help their child if they do not receive it. Doug calls it as he see it. I know...what a concept, but that often is not the correct thing to do or you make enemies. I remember years ago at a coaching clinic years ago when Rene Paragas was speaking about his current podium teams at NXN and Doug asked him who was trying to get his teams to that point, "How do you handle which girl should be #7 or #8?" Yes....that was a thing for him. Gosh..I could not imagine the problems he would've had if they ran the 4 X 800 in CA at the state meet and who does he choose for leg 4 or 5? I remember him telling me one time how he had to end his parent volunteer group for thinking they had equity in team decisions, because they were helping out. I can't believe he made it there that long, but such situations leave a lasting situation of hate and despair towards coaches who do not do what the parents want.

These issues arise from the population of people who are drawn to "running to get/stay skinny" - affluent white girls. The vast majority don't run to run to race or compete, they run and are drawn to the sport to stay thin. Go to a girls / women's mountain bike event or to girls rugby and you have an entirely different population with a completely different mindset.

Nope. I recall one or two former runners who identified themselves and presented non-emotional statements such as "he coached several black athletes". The vast majority of "support"came from anonymous posters who claimed to be involved in the program in some way and who said he was missed and loved by all whome he coached.

Prove me wrong, show me these parents, athletes, former athletes that identified themselves and showed support.

I don’t have a dog in this fight as well, but I do think discounting the story immediately is unfair to the writer

All I know is that the top runners from the Soles era never did anything in college. Seriously, I can’t name a single one on their legendary HS teams from 2012-2018 who ended up performing well at all in college. Not saying these two things are directly correlated but definitely seemed like a high burn out program…

The lack of editorial acumen it takes to greenlight an article like this is shocking.

There are SO many factors that go into whether someone is "successful" as a collegiate runner that is very very unfair to the successful HS programs out there that do churn out great teams.

Can someone name a high school coach whose has had such GREAT teams that went on to be successful on the same level they were at in high school on a consistent basis? Please name one. Joe Newton? Bill Aris? Just because someone is successful in high school in CA Division 1 does not mean they will be dominant in NCAA D 1. I've got bad news for you all...it's not the same thing. I don't care if he had a girl run 4:43 1600m in high school, it in now way means they are going to run a 4:10 1500m girl. When I went to run in college, my coach stunk. Soles cannot be responsible for what he cannot control. The best thing Soles could've done for himself was be dominant in at the D 5 level in CA with multiple state titles and not been successful on the NXN level. That would allow Letsrun people pick on the next guy who has a successful team.

I don't know what Soles has or hasn't done. I give him the benefit of the doubt from what I have seen. But as for the above... Coaches do have a responsibility to not burn out or injury their kids. Especially the top kids you should be setting them up for their college running future not ruining them for it. HS athletes should not be win at all costs.

There's a difference between a top program having a decent number of athletes go on to do well in college, and a top program having almost no one go on to do well in college. Great Oak are probably in the latter category.

so a hobbyjogger magazine thinks training hard is bad.

I'm calling BS on this one.