I attended a clinic with the top high school cross coaches in the country: ask me anything

Big School = Easy Coaching Success wrote:

You know, what do all of these schools have in common? Large student populations. With all due respect, how would these coaches fare at a small school? I think the late Joe Newton is the perfect example of success with a large team from a school system with a large student population.

However you feel about Bill Aris at F-M, he has great success with a small team (from a larger school population).

But, what about the small team with a small population? This is the tough coaching! Your teams are so small that your season can be decided on the whims of one 15 year old choosing not to come out.

To be fair, there are equal (but different) challenges that come with a big school. Building a cultural of winning can be much more difficult, and managing the team in a way that the younger runners are developing can also be very difficult.

For the most part, a great coach is a great coach. Though some may be better suited to a small school or big school atmosphere due to different skill sets.

Big School = Easy Coaching Success wrote:

You know, what do all of these schools have in common? Large student populations. With all due respect, how would these coaches fare at a small school? I think the late Joe Newton is the perfect example of success with a large team from a school system with a large student population.

However you feel about Bill Aris at F-M, he has great success with a small team (from a larger school population).

But, what about the small team with a small population? This is the tough coaching! Your teams are so small that your season can be decided on the whims of one 15 year old choosing not to come out.

You either believe this quote or you do not:

“Champions are everywhere.” - Arthur Lydiard

Second, John O’Malley has a great story about getting a kid out for the team who “would be the difference in us winning a state championship.” He got the kid out.

I’ve not coached HS but my experience is that coaching is hard work; I’m not sure having 100+ kids with 100+ opionated parents and just 1-2 paid asssitants is easy, but again, I’ve not coached high school.

I’ll grant you that if someone looked at NXN data the 2-5 smallest schools that make it each year aren’t from the smallest classifications in their respective states. That said, individuals can make NXN or run the post-season meets in trackfrom small schools, if you believe the quote above.

An image that comes to mind is Greg Weich, coach of five footlocker finalists, hanging outside the gym when basketball announces their cuts. That’s how he got Brent Vaughn out for track. Smokey Hill is a big school so they cut a lot of talented kids from the basketball team. (Note: Greg now coaches at Brookfield HS and is having a ton of success).

One of the coaches featured on High School Running Coach said, “I’m not that great of a coach, it’s just that there are so many lazy coaches out there.”

The better arguement here is that at smaller schools the best cross country runner might be the setter on the volleyball team or the quarterback on the football team and there is an understanding that they will do both. Christian Smith, 800m that dove to make the Olympic team, played football on Friday and then got up and ran xc on Saturday. Small town Kansas and he had to do both.

I know a key point for Mark Wetmore’s high school program was when the 8th grade quarterback came out for cross country as a freshman. Cross country is a big deal at the five schools represented at the clinic. Perhaps part of this thread should be how programs have made it cool. T-shirts and the ways kids get them came up several times during the clinic.

It takes 2.5 hours a day. Would spend more time if we had it.

It is true.

They set the goals. I did found the program with some ideals, but our athletes set the goals we actively go after each day.

Your definition of high school athletics and mine are probably completely different. I don't see it as a offering athletes a job, we offer them a culture. Many like it and stay with it.

What is your culture? How do your teams do?

Doug

Steps. You can set a big goal (winning league championship, etc.), but you then must outline with the athletes what it takes to get there:

-More talent on the team

-More miles

-More time on core

-Consistently doing the little things (sleep, diet, iron, etc.)

Set small achievable goals.

Goal 1 - All varsity athletes are in bed by 10:00 pm.

Goal 2 - All varsity athletes swap out chips for almonds.

Goal 3 - All varsity athletes get in 20 min of core a day before they leave practice.

Once those are mastered and part of the culture, set 3 more goals as a team trying to move towards a program that does everything it can to hit your team set goal.

Do this with the athletes. Have them list all the things you can do to be a better team and help them which goals you will start with and focus on first, 2nd, 3rd, etc.

Keep in mind that the fastest way to make a big jump quickly for an average team is to up your mileage.

Doug

You should not have big goals in highschool running. I am sad for any kid with a coach who wants to "achieve" something.

Yes, heaven forbid. I will rethink this whole venture. Whew, I almost made a huge mistake! ;)

Doug

Great thread.. Thank You!!!!

a couple basic questions.

1. earlier I read a few posts that stressed all aspects of training ( I assume easy pace, intervals, threshold, faster running, , long runs) are done year round with different aspects "emphasized" I would like more specifics.... like in a typical mid season month of XC, indoor, outdoor how many days are devoted to each type of training and how often these kids race.

2. also a lot of stuff on warm ups etc... I watched some of the videos... Do you guys have then do a light warm up say 10-15 min easy before they do those?? I always have done that then we do our version of a dynamic warm up ( after reading this stuff I need to stress this way more and focus more on doing it correctly) ..

3. I agree with no static stuff pre run but anyone do it post run??

Have these coaches received offers to be college coaches? If not, why do you think that is?

If they have, any general insight into why they turned it down? I am not saying college is better than high school just like the NFL isn’t necessarily better than NCAA from a coaching perspective.

Just curious.

maskedfox007 wrote:

Did Soles say anything about how he has a practice that long without major pushback. I feel like anything over 2 hours and kids are coming up with a million excuses why they "have" to leave, even dedicated ones.

I think a part of the key is to keep things moving so that it feels like 2.5 hours of productive time. Sometimes high school practices are long because they just include a lot of dead time (unnecessary time between getting out of school and actually starting practice, dawdling through stretching, unnecessary breaks when transitioning between activities, etc.). If kids feel like they're wasting time, even the committed ones will want to bail. But if you're organized and the kids feel like every minute is actually spent doing things that will make them better runners, most will be fine with the time commitment.

Semenyagoat wrote:

You should not have big goals in highschool running. I am sad for any kid with a coach who wants to "achieve" something.

I'm sad for any kid who doesn't have big goals in anything they do.

Steve McCl wrote:

Have these coaches received offers to be college coaches? If not, why do you think that is?

If they have, any general insight into why they turned it down? I am not saying college is better than high school just like the NFL isn’t necessarily better than NCAA from a coaching perspective.

Just curious.

The "College Coaches are better than HS Coaches" fallacy.

A lot of what it takes to become a college coach is a) being a college athlete and b) being able to live off a low salary for a long period of time.

Some of the best coaches in the US are on the hs level.

Coach Soles,

Thanks for contributing here first of all.

How do you get around CIF rules that state maximum practice hours per week is 18 and you can’t double on consecutive days. For the kids who are in the morning class they would be getting 20+ hours of practice each week and doubling 5 days in a row, right?

I’d like to do the same but our AD said that’s not allowed per CIF. I’m assuming she’s wrong based on some technicality otherwise you’d have been burned for it by now since you don’t try to hide it.

34/50 boys broke 5:00 and 33 /48 girls broke 5:45. Very impressed what you’re doing for these kids. Keep it up. And keep sharing, please!

Big School = Easy Coaching Success wrote:

You know, what do all of these schools have in common? Large student populations. With all due respect, how would these coaches fare at a small school? I think the late Joe Newton is the perfect example of success with a large team from a school system with a large student population.

However you feel about Bill Aris at F-M, he has great success with a small team (from a larger school population).

But, what about the small team with a small population? This is the tough coaching! Your teams are so small that your season can be decided on the whims of one 15 year old choosing not to come out.

I hope you're not a teacher, because you obviously don't know the value of doing your homework, Big School = Easy Coaching Success. Look at the size of the schools in the boys NXN championship back in December, compared to where they finished. Note who's NEXT-TO-LAST in total school enrollment among all the teams that made the field -- Joan Hunter's Loudoun Valley High School (Purcellville) -- you know, the NATIONAL CHAMPIONS.

You also erroneously dissed F-M, saying it has a "larger school population". No, F-M was ranked 17th out of 22 in total school enrollment.

Team ranking based on Wikipedia* enrollments (not current to 2017):

1. Carmel HS / Carmel, IN [Finished 10th] 4830 (coed enrollment)

2. Eleanor Roosevelt HS / Eastvale, CA [Finished 15th] 3868, coed

3. Great Oak HS / Temecula, CA [Finished 6th] 3621, coed

4. Wayzata HS / Plymouth, MN [Finished 11th] 3429, coed

5. Desert Vista HS / Phoenix, AZ [Finished 8th] 3037, coed

6. Flower Mound HS / Flower Mound, TX [Finished 14th] 2550, coed

7. Downers Grove North HS / Downers Grove, IL [Finished 4th] 2456, coed

8. Central Valley HS / Veradale, WA [Finished 13th] 2450, coed

9. Green Hope HS / Cary, NC [Finished 22nd] 2263, coed

10. Mountain Vista HS / Highlands Ranch, CO [Finished 3rd] 2032, coed

11. Christian Brothers Academy / Lincroft, NJ [Finished 7th] 2030 (1015 boys only, guess)

12. Middleton HS / Middleton, WI [Finished 16th] 1989, coed

13. The Bolles School / Jacksonville, FL [Finished 20th] 1800, coed

14. Saint Francis HS / Los Altos Hills, CA [Finished 9th] 1768, coed

15. Kamiakin HS / Kennewick, WA [Finished 17th] 1705, coed

16. Corning-Painted Post HS, Corning, NY [Finished 12th] 1624, coed

17. Fayetteville-Manlius HS / Manlius, NY [Finished 2nd] 1460, coed

18. Timpanogos HS / Orem, UT [Finished 21st] 1453, coed

19. Springville HS / Springville, UT [Finished 5th] 1450, coed

20. Xavier HS / Middletown, CT [Finished 18th] 1400 (700 boys only, guess)

21. Loudoun Valley HS / Purcellville, VA [Finished 1st] 1312, coed

22. Southlake Carroll HS / Southlake, TX [Finished 19th] 1289, coed

*Except Fayetteville-Manlius, where a better enrollment figure was used. NOTE: Two of the schools are boys only, so for the sake of comparisons the total enrollment was doubled for each of these two.

You did not read my post correctly. Thanks for insulting me too.

I wrote about F-M's small TEAM size. Aris does not have 100+ kids on his team (unlike some of these other successful programs). (I've even been to coaching clinics to see him speak too.)

And Loudoun Valley's school population of 1300 is still large compared to A LOT of schools in rural America. They had 130 kids on their team.

I am a teacher and coach; my school has 500 kids in it. We race against schools with as small as 250 kids in their buildings! I often see schools that can barely score because they don't have enough kids on a team.

That's my reality. And, that is the heart if my question.

Someone quoted Lydiard's "Champions are Everywhere" time. That can be an honest answer. You come off as a jerk.

A 2:30 minute practice strikes me excessive, but maybe track/x-c is the only extracurricular these kids are doing. If they all live within 5-10 minutes of the school and get home quickly after practice that could make a long practice work. If they are staying up too late repeatedly with academics because of a 2:30 minute practice then something has to change. Given the performance of his kids that's probably not the case.

Regarding Coach Soles' comments, he has built a culture of accountability and structure. Don't we want that from our kids and employees?

I'm with you. Good god those are huge schools. My school has around 130 students enrolled in highschool.

NXN is Goliath vs Goliath.

Some of you city folks don't know what small schools are!

Loudoun Valley’s smaller student body is (or was) offset somewhat by their school system allowing students to choose their high school as freshmen (unless the school is at capacity, which I’ve read is the case at Loudoun Balley now). Considering Joan Hunter coached a very large youth program in a school district that offers no middle school athletics(making her program THE program for youth runners), you can bet that a few of the serious runners opted for Loudoun Valley rather than the one in their zone. Add to that the transfers they get, and suddenly that 1300 student body is a much larger pool. In their top 15 (all under 16:45 this season), at least three previously competed for other high schools. In another thread, Marc Hunter even commented on getting phone calls regularly by students wanting to transfer.

None of this is to say that the Loudoun Valley program recruits or does anything wrong, but they certainly have a larger population of runners than it seems.

Sorry Doug, not saying you are wrong.

But, I do not believe that 2.5 hours is needed. I do feel that is excessive, balance in life is a good thing. Take running seriously, when you are away from practice enjoy that time as well.

You said it above, if you want to improve your program, run more. That is true, but no HS kid is running 2.5 hours a day with the exception of Gerry Lindgren maybe. If you are running 70mpw that is 10 hours a week at 7:00 per mile, how much ancillary work is necessary? Core is somewhat over done in many cases, you will work the core muscles involved in running while you are running. So, cut the core work in half, 15 minutes per day, I used to do 12 minutes. Do some running related form drills a couple of days per week, some general strength and mobility work. Add in a warm up and anywhere from 1 hour (easy day) to two hours max on a hard or long day. Touch on different areas each day, develop complete runners.

Not saying either way is better, I chose not to go in the excessive direction, was probably not competing on the highest level because of it. But, I wanted to see my athletes have a good experience and continue with the sport and had many continue collegiately and beyond.

Just my half a cents worth.

No argument here. And the pay argument is one for why these coaches may not take a college role (clearly there could be many others, including some personal).

My question was why colleges haven’t offered these coaches a position. If they haven’t, is it because head college coaches assume recruiting is what determines success in college, not runner development, so success in HS like these isn’t indicative of college success?

Or is it because head colleges coaches don’t really truly care about team performance - maybe their job security is more to do with other university functions? Or they’d rather hire people they like? In college football, it’s super cut throat for top talent. It is is business too. Places where results matter. Here is seems top talent is just sitting there and no one cares.