Keys to Arkansas success in Mcdonnell era?

break it up wrote:

The 9:00 kid with the 4:14 mile and 1:57 800 would have had a rough time in this program. I would imagine. Although there were guys like that that survived and filled in importantly on all those Cross Country Championships when the milers had an off day.

Great point. I actually know a 9:30/4:18 kid that did quite well at AR...country boy from Ethel, Louisiana with balls of steel:)

Lots of foreigners came through that program who would not have been eligible at any American University, add some under the table money, sprinkle in a few very talented Americans and you have his teams year in and year out. When a guy can't speak English i'm not sure how he can attend classes and stay eligible.

Not sure where the idea comes from that Arkansas was just filled with foreign athletes with a few token Americans thrown in once in awhile. Yes, they had quite a few foreign runners over the years but if you look at the roster I'd wager that the vast majority of the All Americans runners were homegrown Americans. The Reina brothers, Falcon, Baker, Cooper, Redwine, Wilson, Rock, Morin, Mitchell, and numerous other dudes plus jumpers and sprinters all made that program what it was. The foreign superstars deserve much credit but without the deep bench of Americans, Arkansas would have been just another so-so program in the NCAA.

Hey Desmond....

Guinness on tap in Ft. Collins?

info wrote:

Lots of foreigners came through that program who would not have been eligible at any American University, add some under the table money, sprinkle in a few very talented Americans and you have his teams year in and year out. When a guy can't speak English i'm not sure how he can attend classes and stay eligible.

Zinn, Taylors, Myers, Hallock, Miner,etc. Coach Mc was a master, not just with the foreign athlete - that DMR record that had to be broken by an "All Star" team. Those 4 on the DMR were 4 American high school runners that were developed by John (and staff) Mc was a genious in the distance coaching field and accomplished more than any distance coach at the collegiate level (no contest).

I met Coach Mac and talked to the guys on the team about their training. Like others have said, training consisted of moderate mileage, weights, and a lot of interval work. Easy days were often done at the fast end of easy or even just short of a threshold effort. The actual training scheme seemed sub-optimal to me. HOWEVER, just from the little while I was around Coach MacDonnell and my conversations with him, I can tell you he was an incredible man, a good man, a great coach, someone you believed in and didn't want to let down, etc. That combined with getting much of the best talent in THE WORLD (not just the US) lead to a successful program.

Just my take.

I live in Fayetteville and know Coach McDonnell, somewhat. You may think this is bull but I can tell you that Coach McDonnell has an aura about him that I've never seen in another coach. I wasn't on the team but he let me train part time with them one year. I was SCARED to run bad IN TRAINING and I wasn't even on the team. Being near him almost took my breath away. Obviously he had the coaching ability but he has something else too! Something that makes people run beyond their own expectations, sometimes WAY beyond!

Thats a pretty good example of a XC training week.

A few more points though...

M- Long Intervals. Miles to start. then 1.5 miles. then 2 miles. 3 Groups = A, B, C (Mainly the MD guys). Group A would start out the season avg about 4:30 lows and finish with 4:20s avg. w/ about a 4-4:30 1/2mile jog recovery. I remember Cragg and others dropping a 4:14 on the last one a few times. These were done on the golf course, agri park, or a dirt road. The golf course for instance had a nasty 400m hill at 1000m. And there were some pretty sharp turns. You could easliy argue that they were 5-10 secs slower then a track.

T/Th-Weights & 8-12 depending on the athlete you were. Unless you were going 12 or totally trashed you ran faster then 6 min pace avg. Steady States or Crazy progression runs were common. The pace might start around 6:30 and finish around 4:30. As a walkon, i remember running 41:30 for 8 miles out there and finishing several runs under 4:30. The studs would commonly run 40 mins for 8 miles or 49-50mins for 10.

W-400m repeats- Done on the golf course hill. You would run down, recover, and run back up. We had a 500m stretch with the top 100 being pretty steep. The down repeats were on the bottom 400 and the ups were on the top(steep) part. I remember hearing the paces of 63down/69up with only 50 secs recovery and thinking what the hell did i get myself into. These were brutal. everything was brutal.

Premeet- We didnt race much and those weeks we would take Thur and Fri easy. 6 miles and 8x200 on Thurs, and 4miles on the course and a few strides on Friday. I ran some of my fastest 8k races on the trails at the end of 8 milers.

LR-12.5-14.5. i remember running a 5:58 pace my first LR, beating an eventual 13:30, 28flat guy and almost being left by the van at the pickup. Stories of the top guys dropping 62 mins for the 12.5 were pretty common.

I think you guys nailed a few things on the head. Coach was an amazing man. An Aura is pretty acurate with the 42 national titles to his name def helping. The athletes were extrememly talented. They wanted to win. Coach made you want to kill for him/the dynasty. It was brutal training. I miss it!

Who's writing a damn book already?!!!!!!

In his last years, Coac Mac helped James Strang to the Olympic Trials. James is running pro now, 4th at Pan Am 10k recently and hitting roads pretty well.

opiecunningham wrote:

An incredible amount of work and Tyson chicken.

I agree. Especially about the part of having extra scholarships, courtesy of Tyson Chicken.

Really interesting stuff. Growing up 90 miles from Fayetteville and being a semi decent hs runner, I was always a huge fan of the Hogs and Coach Mcdonnell growing up. I can only describe seeing the red and white singlets blazing around the Okc Myriad track at NCAA's each year as an electricity that was literally palpable. It was inspiring to see him take "average" hs runners when compared to the national hs scene and make them do magic things under his tutelage- re: Pat Vaughn, Brian Baker, Phil Price, Dan Lincoln, Dewayne Miner, etc. As an aside, also great to see Coach Dave on here...many people don't realize that not only did he coach Falcon in hs, but also produced Matt Tegenkamp. One of the most underrated coaches out there, in my opinion.

I first read the title of this thread to be "Kenyans to Arkansas success in Mcdonnell era?"

....To which I would have replied, "Yes."

Please enlighten us with the names of all the droves of kenyans that came through Fayetteville. You're sadly uninformed on the subject, and would suggest you stop your comments before you make yourself look like more of a fool than you already have.

I heard they would get fantastic athletes on partial scholarship and have them live in a house for free, or something like that.

They easily would have over 20 kids that were worthy of full scholarship in any given year.

They had great and deep middle distance and distance runners, great 400m runners, always had a top 3 sprinter, always scored in the long and triple jumps.

They had not just NCAA All Americans but Olympians in almost every event.

Without doubt the greatest Track program ever seen, particularly the era up to the mid-90s.

Regarding the Kenyan/African influence, there have only been a handful, Boit, Kosgei and godfrey come to mind. They certainly didn't play much part in the establishment of the track program in the 70s, 80s and 90s. It was mostly thanks to Americans, Canadians, Irishmen and some Europeans!!

A book detailing the McDonnell era should be a great read!

Godfrey is Zambian.

Another uninformed knob wrote:

Godfrey is Zambian.

Hence the reference to "Kenyan/African." BTW if I am not mistaken, Godfrey was the first black African on the team and he started in the fall of 1994 after a 2 year stint at Blinn. So any African influence on the Razorback team didn't start until after the run of three straight triple crowns was over during the 1993-1994 season. The streak ended with a loss during the 1994 cross season.