My 15-year old sedentary son just destroyed me in a 40-yard dash.

>15 year old son

>building his train set

OK.

For the training, just hand him over to the high school coach and give half an ear to make sure he isn't doing anything dumb. With most high school coaching, they under-work the kids anyway, so your biggest concern might be that the volume isn't high enough in the first place.

If he did 2:30 comfortably, he will probably fit right in on the lower end of Varsity within a year, and should have other kids to push him.

how about wrote:

>15 year old son

>building his train set

OK.

For the training, just hand him over to the high school coach and give half an ear to make sure he isn't doing anything dumb. With most high school coaching, they under-work the kids anyway, so your biggest concern might be that the volume isn't high enough in the first place.

If he did 2:30 comfortably, he will probably fit right in on the lower end of Varsity within a year, and should have other kids to push him.

Well...he's a hobbyist. HO scale. That's his thing. Could be worse and he could be plugged into a video game all day.

But in regards to training...I'm thinking 3-4 miles every other day....maybe joining me for a couple 400's once a week with shorter recovery. What constitutes "under-work" in your opinion?

Thanks!

Dear TMC:

Could you please explain your reasoning as to why your son needs to move up. You just stated he destroyed you in the 40 yd. race, the kid who is faster than your son ran a very impressive 800m almost TWO years ago, BUT you want him to run the 1500m or more.

Hello.

The kid who ran the impressive 800 did it this year - 2017. He also ran a 26 200m, and a 59 400m. So he's quick for an 8th grader.

My son is 15, but we held him back a year (Kindergarten) because he had some learning issues. He was also born prematurely.

I don't think my son possesses 26 second speed in the 200m to be honest...but his ability to hold on to me during my 800m workout makes me think he has distance talent that is untapped. Please be aware that my 200m speed is only 29-30 at full tilt in spikes...and I honestly think my son wouldn't have beat me at that distance.

TMC wrote:

It's true....and we are trying to figure out what event he should run in HS now that he wrecked his old man. I'm 39. I run about 40 miles a week with one interval session and a 10-mile long run, so you can imagine my surprise this weekend when he beat me by about 2 yards.

Why are you surprised that he beat you at something you don't train for??? Interval sessions and long runs do nothing for your 40yd sprint ability. It is apples and oranges.

The idea of inheriting athletic ability is silly and antiscience unless you have actually done a gene examination. It is even more silly to bring genes up if your son only ran a 2:30 800m.

Get him on the team and let him have fun. Good luck!

Huckleberry wrote:

[quote]TMC wrote:

It is even more silly to bring genes up if your son only ran a 2:30 800m.

I think it's impressive that he did it untrained. I'm not saying he is some prodigy but he doesn't run at all and I think with a little more structure he could do much better.

We'll see how this goes. Thanks.

Dear TMC:

That does address some of the questions I had. But at his age, if you start with the LSD (long, slow, distance) stuff and adding up miles, you will hurt his top-end speed.

Sprinting is much harder than distance training. It also has a very finite shelf-life. That is why you have everyone and their mom (literally) are running 5ks, 10ks, half, and full marathons and not 100m, 200m and 400m sprints past the age of 30. You can always add in miles.

Let me put it to you this way, Mo Farah can run his LAST 400m AFTER running 9,600m in 52.2 seconds. That means that even IF, and that is a big if, you can run the last 400m in 60 seconds, you would need a a 41m "cushion" in order to not get beaten. The chances of that happening are not realistic.

TMC wrote:

I think it's impressive that he did it untrained. I'm not saying he is some prodigy but he doesn't run at all and I think with a little more structure he could do much better.

Exactly how slow do you expect an untrained person to run for 800m? And is your son really untrained? Has he never done sports, rode bikes, skateboarded, or anything at some point in his life?

I don't think an untrained 2:30 800m is unexpected for someone who is young and weighs 115 pounds.

Huckleberry wrote:

TMC wrote:

I think it's impressive that he did it untrained. I'm not saying he is some prodigy but he doesn't run at all and I think with a little more structure he could do much better.

Exactly how slow do you expect an untrained person to run for 800m? And is your son really untrained? Has he never done sports, rode bikes, skateboarded, or anything at some point in his life?

I don't think an untrained 2:30 800m is unexpected for someone who is young and weighs 115 pounds.

Don't listen to this unimpressed guy. The fact that your son who from all sounds of it has done nothing even remotely close to any running was willing to run an 800m hard enough to hit a 2:30 is very encouraging. I would say he definitely has some untapped potential that he might really enjoy exploring. It's hard to say without knowing more about him but with a year of some decently hard work, he could be one of those kids running in the 2:0x range. Good luck getting him involved with his HS team, sounds like he has a chance to have some good success in running!

What is his current 40 yd time?

Huckleberry wrote:

The idea of inheriting athletic ability is silly and antiscience unless you have actually done a gene examination. I!

Um, ever hear of Racehorses and Greyhounds?

Are you saying that all you have to do is examine the genes and it suddenly is Science?

It is not impressive at all. My untrained 1600m when I was 15 was 517 and that's not even that good. D

Your son isn't insane or anything. Just wait until Hugh school and then tell him to join xc and track.

Huckleberry wrote:

Exactly how slow do you expect an untrained person to run for 800m? And is your son really untrained? Has he never done sports, rode bikes, skateboarded, or anything at some point in his life?

I don't think an untrained 2:30 800m is unexpected for someone who is young and weighs 115 pounds.

He has never done sports in his entire life. We tried getting him involved with soccer and he just didn't like it. Baseball was too boring for him. I tried to teach him to punt/kick a football because I did that all my life and he didn't see the fun in that either. He has a bike but it's not like he's racing on the thing.

So, I was a bit surprised that he held onto a 5-flat place for a half mile after doing nothing competitive. I'm thinking maybe we stick with the 800 for now and work on some quick stuff if he wants to keep with it.

I also think a good start would be meet with the XC coach soon and see how he plans to train incoming freshmen.

Wishful wrote:

What is his current 40 yd time?

TMC

Why no answer?

Have him run a 100 and 200. Could be a 400 guy.

4.8 is fast enough

Your current time 20 years later is probably more like 6.25 so 2 yards over you is like 5.5 at best

That's okay but not fast for sprint speed

Sounds like your kid is not into sports, so unless it is him wondering how fast he could be if he trained and threw an effort into it you'll never know.

Let him live his life without sports. Likely he's just missing out on 3 years of training and disappointing results and not some lost glory.

Good luck hopefully he sparks an interest in it for your sake.

Damn lol some brutal comments on here. I'd say 2:30 is not bad at all for an untrained 15 year old in a practice run. That's definitely a promising baseline start. I've known people that went from 2:30's to 2:15ish in a season once they learn how to run the race and get some training. But like someone previously said, I'd let him try out other events, maybe 400 and 200 and see what he likes. Even if he doesn't have that much speed now, as he gets older he could see a lot of improvement if he trains hard.

No clue what his 40 time was...the street we ran it on was from residence to residence in my uncle's suburb....so it's an estimate. He cut in front of me a bit but he had a lead on me to do that.

400m. Let him sprint first to see how fast he is.