The Training of John McDonnell Univ. Arkansas

Starting with the man as an individual, he is great, cares alot for the personal well-being of his runners.

That aside, he recruits really good runners from all over the world, and just tries to not let them get slower. He has connections in almost every country, so if there is a really good runner out there, he will know about it first.

His training is not much different than any other college coaches training, although he does inject a certain win at all cost, failure is not acceptable mentality.

I would say the biggest draw back to the hogs right now is their assistant coach, but some people seem to like him.

Which assistant? Lance or Dick Boof! I know you can't mean Danny.

I've seen a few schedules. Nothing out of the ordinary. Easy runs about 5 miles in length in the morning, a longer run in the afternoon (perhaps 10 miles). Sunday is just one long run 14-16 miles. Two to three times a week quality training such as intervals, hill repeats or a race are ran. Standard interval workouts such as 4 x 1 mile; 12-16 x 400; 1600, 800, 1600, 800 or ladders starting with longer slower reps and finishing with shorter faster reps.

In the early winter they don't run on the track too much, preferring to do things such as intervals and hill repeats on the grass or some other non track surface. He doesn't want his runners to progress to quickly when they do interval workouts, because they'll have no place to go when it comes to improvement.

This information is from training articles several years old. I don't know if he's changed anything.

kojo wrote:

That aside, he recruits really good runners from all over the world, and just tries to not let them get slower.

So you think that with these guys Johnny Mac tried "to not let them get slower"?

Cragg -- 13:45 to 13:12

Lincoln -- 4:16 mile to 8:15 st

Falcoln -- 4:0? in HS to 3:49

Lassiter -- 4:05 in HS to 3:36 (and later 3:33)

This is obviously a very very small sample. Do you think that if his guys simply never got slower they would win national championships? Of course not. In fact, I would argue that if you looked at McDonnell's guys across the board, there is a more reliable rate of improvement from HS/Juco to College than at almost any other school, including Colorado and Wisconsin. Does he get talented kids? Of course, but they undeniably get better.

[quote) I would say the biggest draw back to the hogs right now is their assistant coach, but some people seem to like him.[/quote]

Try telling this to his athletes sitting at home with their gold medals right now.

kojo wrote:

Starting with the man as an individual, he is great, cares alot for the personal well-being of his runners.

That aside, he recruits really good runners from all over the world, and just tries to not let them get slower. He has connections in almost every country, so if there is a really good runner out there, he will know about it first.

His training is not much different than any other college coaches training, although he does inject a certain win at all cost, failure is not acceptable mentality.

I would say the biggest draw back to the hogs right now is their assistant coach, but some people seem to like him.

Refering to Richard Dick Booth Age 60, who has been on vacation since 2000. Got the big head after being selected to the Olympic staf. Booth has not worked hard at it ever since, infact the scholarships have now been shifted to the sprints and hurdles because of this. Booth is more worried about installing his "Hair weave" than coaching jumpers..............? Strange Dude

Here's a link to a feature in Running Times, from a few years back.

http://www.runningtimes.com/issues/01nov/arkansas.htm

Gray Hog wrote:

Which assistant? Lance or Dick Boof! I know you can't mean Danny.

refering to Justin Kirby ex-manager nerd.

I ran for Arkansas for 3 years, four if you count my redshirt. Early in cross country it seemed like it was 8 or 10 miles every other day with 12 to 14 on Sundays. Some days were very hard some days easy. As the season progressed 3x1-1/2 mile repeats started. In the middle to late season there were 5 or 6 x mile and 16-20 x 400 up and down a hill at the golf course - minute rest. Hard runs of 5 to 11 miles were thrown in there as well. We also did some circuit training in the weight room 2-3 times a week.

In indoor and outdoor track the distance runs were similar, but the track workouts were different. 1600-4:23 <3 min rest> 1200-3:14 <3> 800- 2:05 <2> 600-1:34 <2> 400-59 <1> 300-43 <1> 200-27. We did that workout all the time. We also did a lot of 12x200 w/ 50 sec. rest in about 28 seconds to prep for a meet. Sometimes we did mile repeats in track as well. Of course there were a lot of different workouts than these, but these were absolute staples. We also kept up the weights.

We always had to hit the times McDonnell wanted you to hit, period!! It was tough, but almost all runners got a lot better. That's what we did in the early 90's. (I have 4 years of training logs to prove this.) I don't know what has changed, but we won a lot then.

I think one of the main reasons Arkansas is always good, is because McDonnell gets 5 to 7 great runners per year. That equals 25 to 35 great runners on the team. Work them pretty darn hard, and you are going to end up with some great teams.

What did you do for kind of weight-training at Arkansas?