HS coach refuses to register athletes for invitationals

running unattached is definitely an option for xc ---> directathletics.com

Not in every state

Situations like the OP, created a little known law allowing anyone to go to another public school for a fee.

Usually this fee is not too much. This way a student or athlete isn't trapped by a mean teacher or neglectful coach.

He’s doing extra work on his own. as I said in my original post, time is limited, he’s got tons a lot of school work, and with 2 hours he spends with the coach practice, even though most of it gets wasted on talking and stretching, he had only weekends and a small window to do extra running and lifting.

the coach has no clue about his summer training, he didn’t bother to know, he just comes in and dictates his own clueless training. It is not just my son, I see some of his teammates strava, some hit 50 miles per week in the summer, now they running 27 miles.

I would counter with that "one mediocre" invitational means he did register them for an invitational. Have your junior blow out that race and get state/national recognition and it might change the mind of the coach to perhaps find an invite to enter. In any case, just train for the State Meet and the post season. My kid has had zero competition that last couple of years so we just focus on training and racing these dual meets and then just aim on winning state and qualifying for NXN.

Bonafide move to nearest school that meets your needs. Happens all the time. Loyalty is not an issue here as the coach doesn't demonstrate it to the athletes and sounds like he has low expectations. That means having to give up a few things but if its that important.

Otherwise, your kid gets his other 40 miles in before school and cranks out the meets he has when he's ready to hammer. A little interest and guidance by the adult would be nice and probably have a tremendous effect on the program as a whole, don't you think? Sorry...wish I could help more.

This is at least better than having a coach who forces low-mileage high-intensity training on the athletes. If he's giving a low-mileage low-intensity program, it's easy enough to just supplement with extra work outside of practice.

Run doubles. Focus on the state meet.

Sadly, as much as we ballyhoo (or criticize out of jealousy) the successful programs and coaches (of which/whom there are many), there are an equal number (if not more) of poor ones. But I feel your pain - athletes who want to do more and/or have higher goals are constrained by the limitations they are given. Where I am from, athletes can join a club which has its own championships (including a National one, which can lead to making a National team). How about the State meet? is there an opportunity (although if poorly trained that will be tough to make) for at least that? Is there no ambition for post-season meets and how do you get into them. You (OP) need to see outside the box, and be prepared, even if out of season to get things done. There may be road races to supplant the HS XC ones, where competition (Older runners) is available. At least these will be timed to to get info for prospective College coaches (outside of track times). As to the training during the week, a kid I coach also trains in the morning before school - he makes time for it.

Being in a team means competing when and where the team does. There's little to nothing you can do about it. I'm not defending this guy. Refusing to give his kids guidance for summer running unless he's paid is scummy. But I personally am a fan of dual meets. Competition is competition. If you're wanting the "big meet" experience it will come with league, district, and state meets, late in the season. It would be good to have some earlier meets to give the kids the experience of running such meets but you get back to the business of competing where the team does.

So many of these types of threads turn up here listing the shortcomings of a coach, school, etc. but don't say much or anything about what's been tried to deal with the situation. Have you actually talked to this coach and gotten a reason for why he won't schedule invitational meets? You say talking to the athletic director and principal won't change anything because he's been there for 25 years. (I assume you mean the coach, not the AD or principal has been there 25 years.) But have you actually talked to them about this or are you just assuming it's useless to do that? It's not hard to find stories of people who have been fired from jobs they've had for decades or who have been told they need to do something different than they've always done. Do other parents feel like you do? If so have you considered organizing them to ask as a group that the school start scheduling some invitational meets? If one parent is complaining about what a coach is doing it's easy to dismiss that particular parent as being a helicopter parent or a little league parent but harder to do that with a group.

Assuming that your story is true, then quit. If you have the support of the other athletes, then encourage them to quit. Everyone writes a letter of resignation for both the coach and the AD. Leave him without a team to enter at dual meets. No one comes back until a new coach with updated notions of training, athlete development, and that understands the new recruiting environment is found.

Hit up local 5K road races or point towards running indoor events unattached. Get private coaching if needed.

College recruiting is an arms race now and kids only get one shot at making an impression. Don’t waste it on old farts stuck in the 1990s.

If in one of those states, run road races. If you're in one of the like 2 locales that don't allow hs athletes to run road races, do it under a fake name. You can be Sportacus Sportan.

The OP doesn't say why he wants his kid racing in invitationals. Road races may be a good solution but aren't going to give the same kind of experience as running a multi team cross country race will. My kids' high school had a very good program that was always a contender for district and state championships. They did run in a couple invitational meets every year so when they got to the big end of season multi team meets they'd have some experience doing that sort of thing.

Big invitationals are great venues to go fast and to gain exposure. A proud athlete wants to measure themselves against the best, not defeat local scrubs so that old Coach Krusty can celebrate another league title and pretend that he’s still relevant. My take is that the kid wants to be good and to see where he stands but his coach is controlling and lazy. Invites happen on Saturdays plus take some planning. Coach just wants to sit on his rump all weekend watching sports on his couch because he isn’t getting paid extra.

So, you just directed someone that wants advice to a video in which you drop the N-word EIGHT TIMES in the first 25 seconds?

Do you think that he is going to watch the rest of the content, after hearing you rant the N-word EIGHT TIMES?

Thats just how things work in imaginary-coach-land. Imaginary kids and imaginary parents respond to that kind of talking.

I'll give some advice as a HS coach myself:

#1 Have you talked to the coach? Any reasonable coach would be willing to hear you out on this, and honestly he should be super excited that he has an athlete running 60 mpw and according to you a few other teammates in the 50's.

#2 If that goes nowhere, then talk to the parents of the other kids running high mileage. You should all go in together and request a meeting with the AD.

#3 If that fails, then you're gonna have to go the unattached route. Or if you have support from other families, form yourself a club and take the group to better races. Depending on the state, you might be shut out of official high school competitions, so look for road races or open meets.

Sorry your kid is stuck in this situation. The bright side is, there's tons of opportunities out there that aren't dependent on the high school scene.

Not sure if there's anything to rescue this year. If other parents have similar concerns, why don't you approach said coach and ask about his plan for the team?

When I ran XC in high school, we started team workouts a month before fall semester. Invitationals were a big thing, also...not to mention league championship, state regional meets, and state championships.