High School XC - Why so many races?

With top kids I agree with you.

For first year runners, or 22+ minute boys, no way. Races for a lot of those kids is the only day they really push themselves, and it takes races to harden them so that they learn how to do it in a workout.

They also learn to pace, learn tactics, etc. That's why we see first year kids start in the 27's and end up sub 20 by the end of the year.

If we only raced 4 times, there is no way those kids would improve as much as they do...much less remain on the team out of sheer boredom.

I agree with your point about the first timers and slower kids.

But for the talented runners it's a very-poor system.

Even the best runners in the world don't race 7-9 5k's in a 2 month span during their race season but we expect our 14-18 year kids to do it.

I think a more reasonable season for High School XC runners would be to race:

Meet - Late Aug

Meet - Mid Sep

Meet - Late Sep

Conference - Mid Oct

Regional - Late Oct

State - Early Nov

That gives them 2 weeks between races and at least cuts the number of races down to 6 for most kids.

Many of the good coaches do hold their top runners out so that they only race every other week or even every third week. For us, the JV season is two weeks shorter, plus we don't take them to a big mid-season invitational. So they only race 3 weeks in a row, get a week off & then race two weeks in a row. Or less if they've been injured at all or have something that interferes with a meet.

I should also add that we also have minimum standards to be able to run in a meet. So for a few of the beginner kids, they might go until mid-season before they even race. Leaving them with maybe 3 races (with a week off in the middle).

If you look at many of the top programs across the country, and the training schedule of many of the top runners, their racing schedule has actually shrunk in size. Many top programs are realizing there is more of a benefit to training rather than racing a meaningless race. However, I do think races for younger runners, and runners that are slower, are very important to keeping the sport interesting and fun.

High school XC, like every other HS sport, is set up for participation...high school sports were not designed as a feeder system for college athletics, even though many believe otherwise.

Look at any other sport (with the exception of football, in which the weekly game set up is firmly entrenched): basketball usually plays at least 20-25 games, volleyball usually has 1-2 matches a week plus weekend tournaments, swimming typically has a dual meet during the week and a weekend invite, baseball plays 40-50 games at least, wrestling is the same setup as swimming basically...and all of these sports attempt to equalize participation between varsity and JV (in other words, there are just as many JV games as varsity games). Now you want to tell a 20:00 XC runner that he can only race 4 times a year because it is better for his development?

Many HS athletes are not running XC for their long-term development or to pursue competitive running after HS. They are there to be on a team with their friends and enjoy improving and competing together.

There are, of course, exceptional runners that DO want to pursue competitive running in college, and for those runners I would say that your argument holds merit. For them, racing too often can be detrimental to their long-term goals.

But what you are suggesting is changing the rule to accommodate the exception.

We used to race a ton in HS in the 1980's. At least two meets a week, sometimes three. I never had a problem with it but I noticed the middle of the pack guys always seemed to run their best about a week before our conference meet and slide a little after that.

I think some coaches go over board these days. Racing only once a week, with a week of no racing in the middle and a cutback two mile race the week before conference. However this is what they may have to do when fewer kids are going out for cross and the ones that do come in without running a step all summer. I think it would be boring however.

the reason wrote:

High school XC, like every other HS sport, is set up for participation...high school sports were not designed as a feeder system for college athletics, even though many believe otherwise.

You are absolutely right. It is not the job of a high school coach to develop world class athletes. High school sports is about participation and fun. Racing is fun. Training is not. Asking a high school kid to train for three weeks between races goes against all that high school sports is about. How is a kid supposed to gauge his progress over a short 9-week season when he is racing only 3 or 4 times?

Some of you are making a strong case for very talented kids to not run XC in high school. They are the exception and should thus be excluded or so you say. Their goals don't match those of High School sport: they want to improve and run competitively beyond high school.

Like so many other things in liberal America we seek to dumb it down to the lowest common denominator.

Why not have races but with no clock and no keeping score. After all winning is fun but losing isn't. Since most teams lose then we might be making it not fun for them. Geez.

We would hate to have anyone excel and if they do surely we want to exlude them or make life tougher for them.

Socialism is creeping in here. Is that what we are teaching today?

I'm thinking back to my own HS days: I'm pretty sure I had about five races during the season (2mi-5k in distance) and then league, section and state. We gauged progress because we would run two courses twice in the season: two of the schools near us had both a midweek dual-meet and a Saturday invitational and we'd run both. I ended up running my fastest times at the end of the season.

I don't think there is a problem with running the 5K distance once a week. I think anyone who is fit can do that, at any age.

It does get a little worrisome though when there are two and sometimes three races in a week.

That's when you start running the weakest meet with a B squad or tempoing one and putting max effort into the most important meet.

"Some of you are making a strong case for very talented kids to not run XC in high school. They are the exception and should thus be excluded or so you say. Their goals don't match those of High School sport: they want to improve and run competitively beyond high school."

That's not what I said. Furthermore, the above example and most of what you posted cannot be considered a logical implication based on my original statements. What the OP was suggesting involved changing the entire set-up of the high school XC season to fit the needs of the elite few, and that is what I pointed out in my original post.

I also mentioned that I agreed with the OP on the point that the system WAS detrimental to elite athletes. Maybe I should have explored that point further:

Perhaps elite athletes, or even very above-average athletes that have competitive running aspirations beyond high school can be treated differently on an individual basis. As someone else suggested, holding them out of unimportant, low-key meets; or perhaps structuring their training around a long-term focus, instead of a 9-10 week season. These athletes could also explore the option of joining a club if their school's coach is unwilling/unable to accommodate the athletes desires.

To respond to your rant, I am in agreement with you about the "dumbing down" of competitive sports. I believe a lack of competitive opportunities is hurting America's youth. However, this topic has little to do with the original argument.

Dude who is shocked wrote:

Some of you are making a strong case for very talented kids to not run XC in high school. They are the exception and should thus be excluded or so you say. Their goals don't match those of High School sport: they want to improve and run competitively beyond high school.

Talk about dumbing down. I guess they're not teaching reading comprehension in schools anymore.

Try reading those posts again. No one suggeste that EVERYONE should be doing the same thing. The majority of high school athletes are not among the elite. When the rare extraordinary athlete comes along, most coaches know enough to help them get to the next level.

OK. It seems like we have seen people go a little to the extreme in both directions but I think most of us are in agreement that it doesn't make sense for the elite high school athletes to race 9 hard XC races in a 2 month period.

I hope what some of you have said is correct and that for the most part they don't.

Thanks for all the thoughts on the subject.

For the record in High School myself I raced only 4 times before the conference meet, sometimes skipping every other meet. It worked for me as I got second in the state championship with my best time of the season but some of my teammates did resent the special treatment I got.

I had friends at other schools though that were equally as good but who's coaches made them race every week and occassionally twice a week and by the state meet they were fried. One who beat me by 20 seconds early in the season I beat by 45 seconds at the State Meet.

I guess an individualized approach is best as much as possible although with 1 coach and 20+ kids it very hard to do.

i race my top kids less than the mid pack types. They understand that to race well, you need to train well and that you can't run 12-15 hard races in any season.

But, i find that most of the kids don't even race at threshold pace, so they can actually participate in 2 races each week because they aren't actually racing.

I agree whole heartedly with the thread starter.

Last year during cross, I raced far too much in my opinion. I opened my season with an 11:00 two mile then a 15:28 during one of my higher mileage weeks, and just kept going hard in races all season. By the end, I was the favorite to win league, sections and place high at state.

I had put too much into my races emotionally all season, got 4th at league, 6th at sections. At state I was able to bring it back for my team and ran 15:50 for 5k just because I knew I had too, but it still wasnt the 15:35 that I had known I was capable of much earlier, and my last mile was still just kind of cruised because I was mentally burned out.

During track my coach and I reflected upon cross and set up a plan where I only raced 3 hard 2 miles going into my section meet, however I ran 800s and 400s hard for supplemental speed work. This worked, I cruised through qualifying rounds and won my section at 3200 in 9:21 and made it to state. Had I done similarly in cross, I think I would have been able to have a much more successful post-season.

During my junior year on the other hand, my first year running cross, it helped me to run hard once or twice a week because I was building initial fitness and learning how to race 3 miles. It also taught me how to go hard in workouts to more or less match the intensity of racing and led to my future success. It all depends what level you are at, I am pretty much summing up what others have said, but using personal examples.

yeah, back in HS we raced a TON.. We did not pull back for certain races although we did "run through" a lot of dual meets.

It's up to the coach to try and manage runners that are planning on running past HS. If that means pulling them out of a meet, so be it. Most HS kids need the races in order to keep their interest in the sport. Unfortunately most HSers are not able to enter a race and take it easy, heck I have a hard time doing that now.

Reading is Fundamental wrote:

When the rare extraordinary athlete comes along, most coaches know enough to help them get to the next level.

Now THAT is funny. My experience has been that most high school coaches don't have the first clue as to what to do with extraordinary distance runners.