trying to save an athlete's season; could use some input

High School Running Distance

12 years ago 04/29/2012 10:04am EDT

One of my high school girls has a lot of natural talent, but has been running pretty badly the last two weeks, especially at the 3200. Her season has been interrupted a few times, most prominently for 2 whole weeks she was unable to run (not due to injury) right as we were starting to put in tougher interval workouts. She came back from that and had a rough rust buster but then ran her best meet of the year the next week.

I imagine it's largely a peaking problem; I'm pretty sure there's no health issue in this case. I'm just wondering if anyone has any advice on some training methods that could help her put together two decent weeks (until the state meet).

12 years ago 04/29/2012 10:12am EDT

re: the letter why

There's not a whole lot you can do physically with only 2 weeks left, but there's an awful lot you can do right or wrong mentally, particularly with high school girls. And that begs the question as to how much of an "emotional runner" she is. My two cents for the last couple weeks is to focus on lower mileage, sharpening stuff, with low pressure, and lots of mental support. If she's naturally talented, then the sharpening will get her to respond physically, and the low mileage will prevent fatigue. And if you can get her to not stress about the bad races or missing some training, then that's a bonus. Good luck.

12 years ago 04/29/2012 11:17am EDT

re: a high school coach

To add to the previous reply, put her in a position to succeed. Don't run her in any races in the short-term that she might struggle with. Instead, run her in off-events where the times may not mean much to her. Get some good workouts in without taking a step back in race day conference, and then hope her natural talent is enough to bring it all together in the important race in a couple of weeks.

Dan

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trying to save an athlete's season; could use some input

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