Get rid of the High School System in America....We need Clubs!!!!

Yeah, American distance running sucks. That's why we beat every country except Kenya in the Olympics at it.

FIX AMERICAN DISTANCE RUNNING wrote:

I hate under qualified, clueless high school coaches. The fact is, for every great high school coach there are 50 awful ones.

I hate athletes who think they are Olympic material and need constant attention at workouts. This takes away time from being able to coach kids that enjoy the sport for the fun and competitive experience.

Your thought process has been contaminated by your believe that sport is only for the elite and for developing world calibre athletes.

Let me give you a clue, son, sports at the high school level in the US is healthy and enjoyed by more athletes than ever before.

Sports in high school may also help avoid in our decline into a cesspool of crime and drugs that affects some communities already...

So, go off and play with your rich friends in the pool and on the soccer field and leave the rest of us alone. We enjoy active participation in sports and our community is smart in continuing to support high school athletics and the coaches who are willing to spend long hours helping kids appreciate the overall benefits of athletics, not just working with elites.

The fact of the matter is that 99.9 percent of runners just run to stay in shape and have fun with friends, and have no interest in going on to run in college, so the current system suits everyone just fine. Also 99.99 percent of runners don't even care enough to give a second thought to any of the problems you described.

The fact of the matter is also that you are an idiot.

The swimming argument doesn't hold water. It is not a world wide sport, mostly a rich white kid activity, blacks in this country don't belong to swim clubs, and they certainly don't have swim clubs in Africa. So, watered down comp.

It is a fair point about coaching. The other developmental aspect of HS and college that is detrimental is that there are many times when a stand out runner is basically on their own for training because they are head and shoulders above the other talent on their team. This happens all the time on the HS level. Less so on the college level, but might be an even bigger detriment as that is the time athletes should be reaching an international level of competitiveness. By comparison, by age 18, anyone in E. Africa who is a top level talent is in a training group alongside the best in the world, as well as the best up and comers.

not only do most HS distance coaches suck, but he/she is also typically uninterested in helping their athletes find resources to help them develop in the off season. So the coach does a sucky job training the kid in season, then drops them at season end with some mumbo-jumb 'go run some miles, kid' (if that), then starts the kid over with the same lousy training months later..

I am really curious of the background of the interscholastic system bashers. Throwing around crap like most hs coaches suck...are there thousands of ready and willing club coaches just sitting around and waiting for the schools to drop sports? There are some really good club coaches and some really bad ones and a bunch in-between. Most of the distance coaches I have known over the past 40 years of competing and coaching are pretty dedicated and hard working people. The neglected group for sure are the field event kids...there just arn't alot of knowledgeable technical coaches to go around at all of our middle schools and high schools. Most conference meets are dominated by the same schools each year in event areas where they have a knowledgable coaches. Throws/PV/HJ/LJ-TJ etc. Glad the swimming issue was addressed as well as it was....sorry for rambling

There are tons of very good HS distance coaches out there, most of these guys/gals were runners themselves and are very interested in doing the best they can for their athletes.Then you have all these club/personal coaches out there constantly bashing the HS system, hoping it gets them more kids/clients. The HS system could use some tweaking, but it ain't the coaches fault all the time.

Precious Roy wrote:

It is a fair point about coaching. The other developmental aspect of HS and college that is detrimental is that there are many times when a stand out runner is basically on their own for training because they are head and shoulders above the other talent on their team. This happens all the time on the HS level. Less so on the college level, but might be an even bigger detriment as that is the time athletes should be reaching an international level of competitiveness. By comparison, by age 18, anyone in E. Africa who is a top level talent is in a training group alongside the best in the world, as well as the best up and comers.

Fair point. Wouldn't it be great for USATF to fund an elite junior development program where any boy who has broken say, 9:10 for 3200m by age 16 would be elligable? Throw in some private schooling.

Until that day, you've got 2 options:

1. continue to bitch and moan

2. go out and start you own club or volunteer to coach at a local high school.

CoachB wrote:

Fair point. Wouldn't it be great for USATF to fund an elite junior development program where any boy who has broken say, 9:10 for 3200m by age 16 would be elligable? Throw in some private schooling.

Until that day, you've got 2 options:

1. continue to bitch and moan

2. go out and start you own club or volunteer to coach at a local high school.

Look at SPIRE up near Cleveland that is working on developing elite high school elites. Schooling included.

Start one then and show it to be a success. They will come.

false wrote:

Any kid worth your effort will run over the summer without your supervision.

At a small school, there are kids that are worth the effort but have no motivation to run in the offseason on their own. A few years ago my school had a kid that got down around 10 flat for the 3200. That time would almost make it to the state in our small school division. Every season this kid would come in way behind, take the whole season to get in shape, and have 1 or 2 good races right at the end of the season. A good summer and winter program and he could have easily been around 9:40 having a chance to place at the state. A couple years later his cousin ran and did run on his own in the offseason. He ran 4:17 and 9:37.

This thread is not just directed towards the elites. They are a lot of 10:20 kids who post on these boards describing some horrid coaching situation. Unless they are hugely talented, a lot of kids never realize their true potential because of terrible coaches.

Bad coaches even effect the slackers!! It's not hard to pick up on the fact that you have a bad team run by an inexperienced coach. What motivation is there for middle of the road athletes to work hard when they know their coach sucks anyway?!?

USATF also sucks.

I've done both parts of #2. Local high school coach with pitiful results (he's also the asst. baseball coach..) wasn't really interested in me - or anyone else - volunteering to work with his kids in the off season. This is the norm..

I live in GA. We typically have maybe 1 girl break 11:00 in the 3200, zero girls break 5:00 in the 1600, & maybe 3-5 girls break 17 in 5k XC. No boys or girls HS XC team in the state finished ranked in the top 100 HS teams nationally.

So yeah - our coaches, on average, suck. Doesn't mean there aren't a few good ones, but they are the exception..

Fair point. Wouldn't it be great for USATF to fund an elite junior development program where any boy who has broken say, 9:10 for 3200m by age 16 would be elligable? Throw in some private schooling.

If a kid has run 9:10 for 3200 by age 16, they are in an elite program and are motivated already. That kind of performance comes from talent, self motivation, hard work and excellent guidance especially if it came in a meet that counted the most like the state meet. They don't need an elite club to screw it up.

I live in GA. We typically have maybe 1 girl break 11:00 in the 3200, zero girls break 5:00 in the 1600, & maybe 3-5 girls break 17 in 5k XC. No boys or girls HS XC team in the state finished ranked in the top 100 HS teams nationally.

So yeah - our coaches, on average, suck. Doesn't mean there aren't a few good ones, but they are the exception..[/quote]

Hey, guess what. 9 times out of 10 the kids will make a coach look really good or really bad. It should start with a motivated adult for sure but there has to be a working relationship for a strong program to sustain itself through the years.

However, if there are motivated kids that come along, running is simple enough that you can still be competitive without a great coach. You don't need someone to hold your hand. Just work your butt off in the off-season(s) to put yourself in a position to have a chance.

There's plenty of information available but again, an experienced coach could help a lot. I get it. I didn't have a very good athletic class when I was in high school but that didn't keep me from working toward my individual goals in running. I didn't need a club either. I still ran road races and AAU track meets in the summer by driving myself to the meets, entering the races, paying my own entry fees etc... I really enjoyed the challenges of trying to place as high as I could against older runners, the t-shirts, trophies, medals, recognition, social atmoshphere etc... It made a huge difference on how I viewed high school meets in the fall and spring. The more competitive/confident a person gets they usually find ways to refine what they do. I also was able to influence my classmates that didn't particularly find running that appealing but we made it fun and it was ours.

As a coach, I cannot run a "coach centered" program and sleep at night. I have to run an "athlete centered" program that allows the athletes an avenue but gives them complete ownership of their success or failures. A system of rewards that are earned is much better than a system of punitive measures that reflects the coaches will to succeed that is greater than the athletes.

At some point, my runners have to spend time on their own to explore their true desire, goals, purpose for what they do without the distraction of their teammates or coaches. The better athletes know this. The developers, social butterflies etc... have less motivation and need the group setting more often than the driven athletes. I can't let my ego get in the way of that top athlete having time to themselves. I don't need that kind of control. There are coaches that have had a lot more success than I have and still have less hands-on in the off-season than I have. You don't need 100 kids out for the sport to be successful either. A core nucleus first will grow but there is always a point of diminishing returns even with large numbers.

Good luck, there is no secret that coaches have. The fact is that some coaches are more interested, organized, experienced and their programs are consistently on top. It still starts with you and ends with you. You don't have to learn any special plays, just start with building up your mileage and being the best the way you know how. If you aren't willing to do that, a coach won't make much difference for you.

The Animal Within wrote:

Yeah worked out great for the UK.

If you can't tell I'm being sarcastic I am. Ask any Brit, they hate their club system and blame it for the lack of depth in the sport. Kids care about their school, not some club you pay to be on.

Agreed re the UK.

Not enough clubs

Not enough tracks

Not enough coaches

Not enough money

The same applies to schools though.

My name is Lance wrote:

I live in GA. We typically have maybe 1 girl break 11:00 in the 3200, zero girls break 5:00 in the 1600, & maybe 3-5 girls break 17 in 5k XC.

If you only have 1 girl under 11:00 in the 3200 and no one under 5:00 in the 1600, but 3-5 girls run 5k under 17:00 each year in CC, I'd say you might want to measure your CC courses!

My name is Lance wrote:

I live in GA. We typically have maybe 1 girl break 11:00 in the 3200, zero girls break 5:00 in the 1600, & maybe 3-5 girls break 17 in 5k XC.

If you only have 1 girl under 11:00 in the 3200 and no one under 5:00 in the 1600, but 3-5 girls run 5k under 17:00 each year in CC, I'd say you might want to measure your CC courses!

In GA our math instruction is worse than any coaching problems.