Training young runners--how is best?

whats best is what works best for the kids and what they enjoy. Supposedly Seb Coe ran like 35 miles a week in hs. Some hs'ers have gone over 100 though and produced results. I wouldn't worry too much about performance at a young age. Using the Coe example again, Coe got beat a lot as a teenager/kid too and there have been runners who rarely lost who didn't succeed in college or post college.

I'd say if the girl likes running, don't restrict her mileage. If she doesn't like intervals, don't get her on the track all the time, to try to beat other 12 year olds. If she likes intervals, have her do more speed training, etc.

unfortunately this is the worse possible location to get a good answer to your reasonable question. I hope you find that answer but asking the letsrun message board is not the approach to take. You may get a few knowledgeable answers and tons of crappy ones, and it will be impossible for you to tell which is which.

Good luck

The middle school I coach at has had some solid success in the last few years. We've had multiple boys right at 5:00, with one running 4:55, for 1600. We had a girl run 5:25 and multiple others under 5:40. These kids aren't world beaters, but they're obviously pretty strong.

Really, we probably undertrain our kids a bit. As the spring goes on and the workouts get harder, I've had kids ask me "how come we weren't doing this all season?" I'd rather they stay healthy and enjoy it than burn themselves out quickly. For middle school, I think this is important. Some of these kids will run themselves into the ground at age 13 if you let them. I'm just trying to get kids to love and understand the sport. With certain ones, you can almost instinctively tell how much they can take or want to take. It's tough to find that balance, but for a middle school kid, I'd rather hold back a bit and make sure they have a strong, healthy season or two than burn them out before they even get to an intense high school program.

Yeah, I know there's a lot of garbage on this board. But other running boards aren't much better. The milesplit one for my state is full of old fogies who are fixated on boys and on their alma maters and mostly ignore the girls. Also, when I asked a training question once about my older child, I got accused of being one of those pushy parents who thinks their kid is a star who needs special attention when she's probably stinky and was chewed out for not trusting the school coach, yada yada.

Well, I've been around enough to have seen that most middle school and high school coaches don't know very much. They might be OK for the average kid, but have no idea what to do with real talent. My older daughter suffered for that, and it's pretty amazing she did as well as she did with the poor coaching she had. The middle school one isn't as mature or savvy and will need more guidance from me to navigate the sports system.

nordicmama wrote:

Also, when I asked a training question once about my older child, I got accused of being one of those pushy parents who thinks their kid is a star who needs special attention when she's probably stinky and was chewed out for not trusting the school coach, yada yada.

You are crazy if you think this site is any better, its actually worse. Most coaches with experience enough to help you aren't going to post here. I recommend you read some book and articles or talk 1-on-1 with am experienced coach you trust rather than look on message boards and forums and expect to get real or good advice. Your kid deserves better.

Thanks--I'm new here, so haven't read many threads yet. I have looked at some books, but most are geared to the high school runner not the youth runner. A girl who hasn't gone through puberty yet is a different case, I'd imagine.

The problem is I don't know an "experienced coach I trust." Her club coaches seem OK, but they're not sure why she's getting beaten that badly nor what to do about it. The high school coach--big no on that one. Middle school coach was a baskeball player making some extra money. Can't afford to hire an expert, even if I knew where to find one, and Salazar is pretty busy already.

nordicmama wrote:

Thanks--I'm new here, so haven't read many threads yet. I have looked at some books, but most are geared to the high school runner not the youth runner. A girl who hasn't gone through puberty yet is a different case, I'd imagine.

The problem is I don't know an "experienced coach I trust." Her club coaches seem OK, but they're not sure why she's getting beaten that badly nor what to do about it. The high school coach--big no on that one. Middle school coach was a baskeball player making some extra money. Can't afford to hire an expert, even if I knew where to find one, and Salazar is pretty busy already.

Consider Tinman. Fairly reputable, won't burn her out. May not be a Salazar but is good enough to start with.

You mention her club practices 2 days a week...the club my kids run with practices 4 times a week year round. I know many other clubs do the same. So that right there is probably a big part of the answer to your question about why these young kids are so fast.

Club training >> Middle school training around here, and > than most HS training as well. HS track practices will be a piece of cake for my kids after 8-9 years of club training. Many of the MS/HS athletes also come to our practices after their school practices to get in some extra work. Some states may not allow that though.

If she's losing middle school meets in California, no problem. If she's losing in any other part of the country then I'd change the training.

i'm no expert, but i have coached h.s. for 20+ years and i have 3 kids of my own with youth experience--one is a 10 y/o bantam, one is now a h.s. sophomore whom i help coach, and one is now a freshman at ucla whom i helped coach through h.s. and with youth running (i became less involved with his youth club when he entered h.s.).

here would be my advice: keep it fun. if the kid wants to train more, let her. if not, don't. she'll have plenty of time to develop in h.s., and i don't think there's any huge advantage to cranking up the mileage now. the reality is it may not have any substantial effect anyway. it might, but it might not. my son for example was extemely mediocre in 6th and 7th grade. i would have hated to think i needed to change up his training, and i think i can safely say for him it would have had little effect--he might have moved up from 7th man to 5th, but he would not have been a world-beater. letting growth take its time, as an 8th grader he showed glimmers of talent during cross, then really started to blossom in track (around 4:27 1500m), simply because he started to develop and grow physically, and NOT because we changed up his training. then in 9th grade he really took off (4:31 1600m by track). best of all, even as a redshirt at ucla, he's enjoying running as much as he ever has or more, and putting in around 50% more miles than in high school.

if you're worried about having the fastest 12 year old, you've lost sight of the endgame. if there's talent there, it'll likely manifest itself with time (assuming you've got some decent h.s. programs around). if the talent is limited, it'll probably still see some limits even if she does train harder now. hard work may win many battles versus talent in high school, but i suspect it's not as true with youth, where great talent can get away with little training and still have success.

i hope this helps, but as another poster suggested, tread lightly on these boards...

someone new wrote:

You mention her club practices 2 days a week...the club my kids run with practices 4 times a week year round. I know many other clubs do the same. So that right there is probably a big part of the answer to your question about why these young kids are so fast.

Club training >> Middle school training around here, and > than most HS training as well. HS track practices will be a piece of cake for my kids after 8-9 years of club training. Many of the MS/HS athletes also come to our practices after their school practices to get in some extra work. Some states may not allow that though.

Which state is your club located in?

club coach wrote:

Which state is your club located in?

Oklahoma. And yours?

Kansas. I would say some club coaches here who have taken up the year round training and racing mantle have managed to injure more elementary and middle school athletes than develop them. But things may be better down there.

I don't care that she's not winning at this age. Middle school means nothing. My concern is that now with so many girls running so fast so young, it will take more/harder training than what is healthy long-term in order to be competitive in high school when success does matter more.

It seems to me that the level of competition in girls xc and track has risen dramatically in the past few years. Kids are really upping the ante with mileage and private trainers, and more and more high school runners are ditching their high school teams to train with elite clubs who take them to open college meets. On the other hand, I think there are also a lot more injuries too, especially stress reactions. I've sort of followed the college careers of the top girls from our area who graduated high school a year or two ago. Many of them have been plagued by injury in college and haven't run well yet--compartment syndrome, stress fractures.

My older daughter did not run high mileage in high school, but she also never won any big races like the girls who did. We tbought that was OK, because then she could do her best running in college and wouldn't be burned out. But at college, she found the training to be a humongous, difficult step up. She's still adjusting to it as a soph., so her lack of prior high level training is costing her in her college career too because the girls who came in at higher mileage/better training took off right away and are contributing. She's been languishing on JV, though she hasn't had any overuse injuries, mono, eating disorders or drug and alcohol problems either.

My concern is this: it's all well and good to stress low mileage and moderation for pre-college kids, but as long as there are enough young runners who are willing to take the risk of more intense training, the intense ones will leave the moderate ones in the dust. They'll get the college offers too. When people talked about those high school girls running 70 miles per week, they'd assure me that college coaches wouldn't be that interested in them because there would be less room to grow compared to a lower-mileage kid. Well, from what we saw, that was baloney. College coaches not only wanted them, they offered them scholarships to boot.

So where is the balance? I know there's no answer, but thought it could be something to discuss.

club coach wrote:

Kansas. I would say some club coaches here who have taken up the year round training and racing mantle have managed to injure more elementary and middle school athletes than develop them. But things may be better down there.

I can see that if they are running tons of speedwork all year without much if any base...there are some clubs down here that are that way. The club we belong to emphasizes the distance base, and they're mainly running longer slower runs this time of year from now right up until April.