high school runners not ruuning enough!

Never seen a guest train either.

The deal in this country is that teens have a reasonably distinguished high school career to set up a scholarship at a major college track power and then, if they haven't destroyed any crucial body parts, perhaps a pro career afterward. Meanwhile, Kenyans and Ethiopians are worldbeaters at 19. It seems, from interviews I read, that a lot of the boys and girls in the top five at Foot Locker Cross Country run no more than 35 miles a week. Obviously it gets them to that desired level.

Mr Visionary wrote:

The deal in this country is that teens have a reasonably distinguished high school career to set up a scholarship at a major college track power and then, if they haven't destroyed any crucial body parts, perhaps a pro career afterward. Meanwhile, Kenyans and Ethiopians are worldbeaters at 19. It seems, from interviews I read, that a lot of the boys and girls in the top five at Foot Locker Cross Country run no more than 35 miles a week. Obviously it gets them to that desired level.

According to Marc Bloom's "The Harrier" this is not true, particularly with the Boys.

I agree with doing high mileage only if your body is capable enough to deal with it, that being if your body is physically mature enough to take the pounding. If someone puts in the miles but doesn't run sub-4:20 or 9:00 doesn't mean he's doing anything wrong. I think what really helps a runner run faster times is too have good speed. Speed counts for a lot and not many people bring it up. I hear a lot of guys bragging about how there pr in the 400 is 57sec or whatever and how there able to still run good times. But they don't realize how much faster they could run if they worked on getting faster or just focused some on there macanics. Just a thought.

look.... many great high school runners like Hulst, Lindgren, Ryun, (etc...) burnned out before 25. If you look at many of the great African distance gods, they didn't start cranking out good results til they were in their late 20's early 30's and in some cases, even later. I think that the greatest distance runners are the runners who may not win many high school competitions, but peak later on in their careers. Look at Roger Bannester, he didn't even start running til he was 17 or 18. I mean c'mon, he didn't even break 4:20 til he was 20. His workouts were only 30mins long, 5 days a week. Any runner can be successful on just a 30-40 mpw base if those miles are done correctly. There is one person in my community who runs 24:xx 8k's on 25 mpw base. Looking at all this evidence, it is safe to say that both high intensity/volume and high intensity/low volume are both very successful ways to run, but if you want to avoid burnout/injuries, high intensity/low volume is the best.

think about this, the kenyan kids who train 100 miles a week and fail spend the rest of their life in poverty. the americans who fail on 35 miles a week get college degrees and make 80k a year. distance running is not the end all, be all of life, and there is a lot more incentive for americans to spend their time doing something else than there is for kenyans

Since when did Ryun "burn out?" Or Hulst, for that matter? There was nothing for Ryun to continue training for (excluding the comedy called ITA) and Hulst was like Webb - he was physically more mature than his peers and went as far as he was going to go in his high school years. Lindgren was just plain "out there".

malmo wrote:

Hulst was like Webb - he was physically more mature than his peers and went as far as he was going to go in his high school years.

A concept completely lost on this group.

By "burn-out" i meant you hear a lot about them in high school and a few years (up to 5) after that, then they drop off and never hear from them again.

I think the main problem is looking at high school as such a big indication of what's to come. These kids are put under so much pressure to preform. They put in insane weeks and just compete so much. Anything less than a win from them is viewed as a failure, so they keep training and their bodies break down. Look at many of the most successful African runners, many didn't start til later in their lives. It is time that we stop viewing high school as a running curcuit, and start seeing it as a way to introduce kids to running.

York HS- plenty of kids do 100+ miles per week in the summer running program. Trust me on this.

Mr Neer, I know not what's in Bloom's "The Harrier," but interviews done right around the time of Foot Locker with the top entrants at mensracing.com, fast-women.com, and runnersworld.com indicated some surprisingly light mileage. You can look it up.

I know, many high schoolers do high mileage training, but there is no real need. I understand that they are a very good high school program, but we don't need kids peaking at 20-22, we need them peaking at late 20's, early 30's. What does it matter if the kid is fast in high school if he will still get smoked by the kenyans. If we slowly build up mileage each year and peak them when they are older, we will have a much better chance against the africans. One of the problems I have witnessed is the low rate of kids running after high school. With such high mileage being thrown on kids, running doesn't seem fun and many just quit. Who knows if one of the kids who quit could have been the one who would have been the next great American runner. This just re-enforces my stance that high school running should not be looked at like a running curcuit, and instead as a stepping stone to greater things.

I think jtupper made a comment on this messageboard a while back, something to the effect of, "Any training that produces improved performance is the right training at the right time." There are many runners who succeed on high mileage (Lindgren, malmo, York HS (IL)) and there are many that succeed on lower mileage (Coe, Flanagan, Bingham HS (UT)). We were treated to a pair of the best HS milers the US ever produced last year in Steve Magness and Ari Lambie. Magness upped his 100+ while Lambie "upped" her mileage to about 35. The result were outstanding, with Magness at 4:01 and Lambie #3 all-time at 4:37. Both high mileage and low mileage can result in great performances.

Although many top HS programs seem to be shrouded in secrecy (we would all love to know what Saratoga Springs does), Jeff Arbogast at Bingham HS in Utah openly promotes his training methods. Explanations of his four macrocycles, the team's mileage totals, differences between training by seniors and freshmen, etc. are all available on the website below. This is a highly successful low-mileage program that has produced 2 national championship teams in the last 9 years. Take some time to read through the website, especially the "Articles".

Recent State Meet Results

2003

BOYS - 1st (7, 14, 15, 17, 23) = 76

GIRLS - 4th (1 K. Zeigle, 17, 31, 34. 42) = 125

2002

BOYS - 2nd (6, 12, 17, 22, 28) = 85

GIRLS - 5th (7, 25, 26, 36, 38) = 132

2001

BOYS - 2nd (13, 14, 18, 20, 24) = 89

GIRLS - 2nd (1 L. Zeigle, 2 J. Zeigle, 11, 19, 21) = 54

J. Zeigle 7th at Footlocker Nationals

2000

BOYS - 3rd (3, 7, 16, 17, 32) = 75

GIRLS - 1st (2 L. Zeigle, 3 J.Zeigle, 11, 12, 20) = 48

L. Zeigle 3rd at Footlocker Nationals

1999

BOYS - 2nd (3, 5, 7, 22, 23) = 60

GIRLS - 1st (1 L. Zeigle, 2 J. Zeigle, 4, 5, 7) = 19

L. Zeigle 12th at Footlocker Nationals

FINAL US RANKING #1

* Some arguments have been made that this may have been the best HS cross country team of all-time, although some of the Saratoga teams in recent years may challenge that claim.

1998

BOYS - 2nd (9, 18, 20, 25, 27) = 99

GIRLS - 1st (2 L. Zeigle, 4 J. Zeigle, 5, 11, 13) = 35

Some other notes:

1995 Boys Team was ranked #1 in nation

From their website: "The 1998 season saw the 41st, 42nd, and 43rd athletes graduate to full scholarships in cross country or track and field (mainly distances) since 1990. . .a record that may be tough for any school to beat nationally."

Two Bingham alumni will be competing in the Olympic Marathon Trials this year: Curtis Moore (2:18:48) and Corbin Talley (2:21:33)

Mr Visionary wrote:

Mr Neer, I know not what's in Bloom's "The Harrier," but interviews done right around the time of Foot Locker with the top entrants at mensracing.com, fast-women.com, and runnersworld.com indicated some surprisingly light mileage. You can look it up.

Whoopity-doo. They can run 15:30 for 5k. Sweet. The TOP few do much higher mileage. If all of this low mileage stuff is the way to go, why are the MILLIONS of high schoolers running low mileage not improving greatly and running awesome times? Train like everyone else and you'll only be as good as everyone else. The best ones run high mileage with the exception of a ridiculously gifted few who are fortunate enough to be successful off of low mileage.

To the poster who said everyone on his team who ran low mileage in high school ran much faster in college, I find exactly the opposite with my team. The top guys all ran 50+ at least in high school (with a few getting into the 70-80 range). I ran 35 mpw in high school and was fairly successful then. When I got to college, I was waaaaaaay behind my teammates who had a better base from higher high school mileage. It took me about 2 years to get adjusted to the higher mileage and now I'm improving significantly. I REGRET running only 35 mpw in high school. If I could do it again, I would've run about 50-60 and I would've had much more success much sooner at the college level.

And I too would like to hear of these unsuccessful "higher mileage" guys.

Im not saying they wern't successful, it's just that these "high-mileage" people were only successful in high school and a few years after that. They seem to disappear. Like I said before, all of our good talent is being burned out and peaking too soon.

Bingham's Low-Mileage Approach wrote:

We were treated to a pair of the best HS milers the US ever produced last year in Steve Magness and Ari Lambie. Magness upped his 100+ while Lambie "upped" her mileage to about 35. The result were outstanding, with Magness at 4:01 and Lambie #3 all-time at 4:37. Both high mileage and low mileage can result in great performances.

The mile is a unique event in that you can run fast in it off of almost any type of training. You can take the approach Ryun took (high mileage) or the approach Coe took (low mileage). The results can be pretty similar and I don't think you can argue one being "better" than the other all the time. That really depends on what type of body you have and what type of training you're used to. For these reasons I feel the mile is a bad event to compare training methods.

Yes, Lambie ran absolutely awesome in the mile off of pretty darn low mileage. But her XC performances suffer (she was able to get away with it in high school because she's extremely talented). This is why she can mop the floor with Katy Trotter in a mile, but Katy is much better at XC (the Trotters ran up to 50mpw in high school).

I'm not saying they wern't successful, it's just that these "high-mileage" people were only successful in high school and a few years after that. They seem to disappear. Like I said before, all of our good talent is being burned out and peaking too soon.

--No sure whether to laugh or cry.

Let me say my standards real fast for mileage....

Super Low: 0-30

Low: 30-45

Normal: 45-60

High: 60-80

Exessive: 80 and up

Those are my standards. Just to clear up what I mean when I go off on my ramblings about mileage!

hey ya wrote:

Yes, Lambie ran absolutely awesome in the mile off of pretty darn low mileage. But her XC performances suffer (she was able to get away with it in high school because she's extremely talented). This is why she can mop the floor with Katy Trotter in a mile, but Katy is much better at XC (the Trotters ran up to 50mpw in high school).

NCAA Cross Country

Katy Trotter - 21st - 20:29.4

Arianna Lambie - 24th - 20:31.6

HOLY COW! She beat her by a whole 2.2 seconds! That's 0.59 seconds faster per mile! Trotter absolutely CRUSHED Lambie. Ari should go hang her head in shame! Katy Trotter is obviously "much better at XC" due to the higher mileage. Come on, 24th in the nation as a freshman? Lambie might as well hang up the running shoes until indoor track; she is terrible at XC since she didn't do enough miles in high school.

Oh, and by the way, since "the Trotters" (implying both of them) ran 50mpw in high school and Lmabie ran less, why did Amanda Trotter finish 92nd in 21:12.4, 0:40.8 behind Lambie?