How can I improve when my coach is an absolute moron?

Here's what we did my first two weeks of XC (yes it was the same both weeks)

Monday- 3 miles hard, 1 recovery, 5-10 minute break, 2 miles hard, 1 recovery, 5-10 minute break 1 mile hard

Tuesday- 2 miles hard, 1 recovery, 5-10 minute break, 2 miles hard, 1 recovery, 5-10 minute break, 1 mile hard. Coach encouraged me to do the 2 miles at 5:35 pace even though I was only in ~17:40's shape at the time.

Wednesday- 45 minute recovery, thank God.

Thursday- 70 hills in the form of 10 hills, 3 minute break, 10 hills, 3 minute break, etc. 2 miles hard after

Friday- 2-mile time trial (race pace)

Keep in mind these are workouts from the FIRST TWO WEEKS of practice (in August). And while I know Daniels reccomends two hard days in a row, he doesn't reccomend the same exact type of crappy workout (Monday/Tuesday)

transfer schools?

asldfm,sd wrote:

transfer schools?

Negative, I'm in the IB program, which is only at this school.

Don't run hard in all of those workouts. You'll probably be beating all of your teammates by the end of the season because they'll be fried from all those workouts.

quenton wrote:

Don't run hard in all of those workouts. You'll probably be beating all of your teammates by the end of the season because they'll be fried from all those workouts.

Yes. Sandbag the workouts AND run a huge winter base so you can handle the speed workload once the season starts.

quenton wrote:

Don't run hard in all of those workouts.

Considering this guy could do 17:40 off base and this coach sounds terrible, I'm assuming he's one of the top guys. Don't you think the coach might ever wonder why one of his "star" runners is suddenly doing mile repeats at 6:30 pace?

Cassidamius wrote:

quenton wrote:

Don't run hard in all of those workouts.

Considering this guy could do 17:40 off base and this coach sounds terrible, I'm assuming he's one of the top guys. Don't you think the coach might ever wonder why one of his "star" runners is suddenly doing mile repeats at 6:30 pace?

Who cares. He can do 2 of the workouts hard each week instead of 4. His race results will show that he is still the top guy.

Transfer to flagler, they have an ib program

Cassidamius wrote:

quenton wrote:

Don't run hard in all of those workouts.

Considering this guy could do 17:40 off base and this coach sounds terrible, I'm assuming he's one of the top guys. Don't you think the coach might ever wonder why one of his "star" runners is suddenly doing mile repeats at 6:30 pace?

Well I'm not exactly a star runner, I was our #5 guy pre-injury (our school has over 3000 students and 100+ kids come out for XC every year... and yet we have nobody under 16 or girls under 19) but I think my coach might notice that. I suppose I could always pretend to be sick/injured/having a bad day if he ever asks though.

Stupid question, has anyone tried to talk to this coach about his asinine training? Maybe if you and your teammates got together and talked to him as a group you could get through to him. Xmas is coming, buy him a book about training lol Do something!!! Think about all the kids that will come after you and the damage this coach will do to them. How does he keep his job?

I am your coach????????

I assume you get a chance to prove yourself in some sort of time-trial right? If that's the case, you run those hard workouts easy and you don't make any apologies or excuses for it. Just do it. Don't announce what you are doing. Don't proclaim to the coach that you are on some sort of alternate program, just stay well back and don't race the workouts, except once or twice a week as a normal person would do.

Then, when the time time trial comes, you go balls-out and show him what proper training does.

simple answer: buy your coach a book as an end of season gift: Daniel's Running Formula.

not as simple answer: read it for yourself.

Brady Grapehouse wrote:

simple answer: buy your coach a book as an end of season gift: Daniel's Running Formula.

not as simple answer: read it for yourself.

I already have read it, a number of people have tried to "educate" our coach over the year with very poor results. Somebody two years ago gave him a Lydiard book and he threw it straight in the trash. I don't really understand his thought process in doing that, but it's probably futile, he doesn't think there's anything wrong with our program even though we choke at the end of the season every year.

I'll just reiterate what the other guys are saying...

As long as you have an opportunity to prove yourself in an official time trial, or early season meet or something, just sandbag the workouts.

Like the other guy said don't announce it. Don't exactly jog them.

Looking at your coach's workouts and your fitness (17:40) here is what I would do.

Monday - do these at 6:10 pace. Tempo. No faster. It won't look like your sandbagging. But still a lot of eager stupider runners will be faster then you that day. But who cares. Just chill. As your fitness starts to improve go a little faster, but keep it 30 seconds or so slower then 5k.

Tuesday - gotta sandbag this one. maybe kill two birds with one stone and run with the girls team and try to pick up?? Coach will just blame it on hormones. Or I don't know find a way to sandbag this.

Wednesday - Now the problem is Wednesday should actually be a bit harder. Short track stuff. Do a secret workout on the track at 4:00 in the morning, 400s at mile pace, 800s at 5k. Stuff like that. Then still show up for 45 minute recovery. Run this slow as heck. 10 minute pace. Make coach think your handicapped.

Thursday - Don't know how long the hill is, but with the time trial tomorrow take these hills mainly easy. Every fourth or fifth one put in a 10 second surge and pass all the yahoos on your team, but ease off before the top and let them pass you back. This will develop some power, and also mess with the minds of the yahoos.

Friday - Hammer the time trial, all out. Balls to the wall.

You said a past teammate veered off last season. I would assume he tried some of the suggestions made on this board, scaling back effort at workouts, etc. How did the coach respond to him doing that. I would assume the coach would expect a valiant effort at practice and is smart enough to know when someone is sandbagging it.

I think the only answer is all the top guys stage a sit out! Power in numbers or do most of the team "believe" in this coach??

pick and choose when to push; as simple as that. My HS coach had us doing 4 workouts a week during xc, and when we would do easy days he would always give break it up (3 miles, 5 mins rest, 2 miles, 5 mins rest, 1 mile). But I found a way to make it work.

Sadly, this is a somewhat common scenario. I recently coached a HS team as an assistant coach that had a head coach with a similar philosophy. Fortunately, he wasn't too hardheaded so I was able to work in some more reasonable training strategy.

It sounds like your coach is pretty stubborn though. I agree with others that have said you need to get the top 5-10 guys together and talk to the coach. You'll probably want to be diplomatic about it and even try to make it seem like it was his idea to change things up.

Perhaps you could get your guys together and tell the coach something along the lines of "Coach, your workouts get us into pretty decent shape, but it seems like we're not reaching our full potential and we get injured a lot. Is there anything we could be doing differently to gain that extra edge?"

In other words, stroke his ego a little bit, then present the issue to him, and also state your desire to reach that next level. If he's somewhat reasonable, he'll probably retool the training a bit. It may backfire, but it doesn't sound like things could really get much worse.

If he won't listen to reason, then you're probably just going to have to sandbag some of the workouts to reach your full potential.

I highly recommend the team approach, though, because (like other posters have mentioned) you have to consider the guys coming after you. Also, if the whole team is working on a smarter training plan, that can only help you out in the long run.

Good luck!

Send him an email with the link to this thread!