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

wejo wrote:

Of course these schools have generally big populations, doesn't diminish the fact these coaches are VERY good coaches. Two different threads I want to start is "what is the best small school coach in the country?" "what's the best inner city XC program in the country?"

I'd love to see the last question discussed. I teach at an inner-city school in a large East Coast city. We have problems getting kids out and when we do, we are running in the concrete jungle. We have a cinder track that when it gets a drop of water is essentially a mud pit. The kids all want to be sprinters because that's all they know even though the city has one of the biggest road races in the country and we have some fantastic parks/paths. We don't get buses to invitationals from our District, nor do we get them to parks anywhere around. I know there have to be other schools out there with similar problems and I'd love to talk to some of those coaches. I attend clinics around here and every time I show up, the suburban coaches are stunned to see a city coach and our problems are almost never similar.

wejo wrote:

epicTCK wrote:

what kind of mileage are these kinds of programs doing?

even on a low mileage program, at our school we deal with injuries. What do these programs do to prevent injuries?

A lot of the coaches stressed it's not about the miles. It's more about tailoring the stress to each kid.

This is exactly the best advice ,otherwise it’s all noise.

Wejo - start the low socioeconomic thread. It would be great.

I talked to Billy Poole-Harris the coach at Whitney Young in Chicago a couple years ago. I started talking to him because Whitney Young has been a pretty good team for a while now and wanted to great job . He probably has similar issues. I found it humorous when he said his kids had to "run in the concrete jungle." It was more like he was saying his kids were tough because of it. Almost everyone runs on paved surfaces. It can either be an excuse or a positive.

I'd say it all goes back to building a winning culture. Once the culture is in place success will follow.

Wejo- did any coaches mention the dancan system?

I have to ask wrote:

Wejo- did any coaches mention the dancan system?

+1 ?

Why wasn’t the new Swedish top coach there?

Texas HS Coach wrote:

Economically disadvantaged in Texas means on free lunch program.

Maybe it is different elsewhere?

I think you can have good teams with lower socioeconomic status, but I think the chances of winning state or NXN become much, much smaller. Having a McFarland experience is much more likely.

That's what it means here in CA also. There are very few of those kids on my roster. It's not for my lack of trying. We have a huge school district. It extends 35 miles to the east. There are quite a few kids that don't come out because they can't miss the bus home and their parents can't pick them up. For the low SES kids that do live in town, there always seems to be 5 obstacles for every one obstacle presented to a more affluent kid. Can't afford shoes, dad got deported, can't get an appointment for a physical, have to stay home to watch siblings while single mom works....

I guess when I said I never thought it was a problem for me at Hughson, I meant that once the kids come out for my team, we find a way to make it work for them.

While we don't have a huge or well resourced talent pool to draw from, we do have some advantages that other schools would love to have. We do most of our training on a soft dirt and walnut hull covered levee of our local irrigation canal. It goes miles and miles out into the country. We have a well maintained community arboretum, where I've measured out loops from 200 - 1600m. We have a community that is tremendously supportive of EVERY sport at the high school. And we have an administration who does whatever they can to facilitate our program.

We're probably getting too far off topic from the original gist of the thread. I actually am VERY interested to know what these successful coaches do and then trying to adapt it to my system.

It is not really about the school size in most cases, it is about how many runners you get out for the team. If you have 70+ runners come out for the team you will find 5 talented (high school level) runners. The high school programs that tend to be good over many years have large teams. It is a numbers game to find the talent. Contrast that will college where you can have small recruited teams because the talent has already been vetted at the high school level.

Put a few random notes in.

Texas HS Coach wrote:

Wejo - start the low socioeconomic thread. It would be great.

I just started one. Didn't contribute much because I have more questions than answers, but its up in the HS forum!

PWD wrote:

But, it doesn't really take 2.5 hours a day. That is untrue.

You have convinced them that your goals are their goals. This is not a job, it is HS athletics.

A whole different thread could be on how much time should kids put into high school sports or running in general.

There are diminishing returns with anything in training and I think a lot of people focus on the trees for the forest. But if he's got 2.5 hours and his kids are willing to put in the time what's wrong with that? If he was running them too much, they were all getting injured, quitting the team and unsuccessful that would be one thing, but he has built a program where a lot of kids want to be a part of it and they are very good and they practice more than your school. So he's doing all the little things most runners don't have the time to do.

Sounds like his runners are learning what can be done with a ton of hard work and are committed to a goal.

The low socioecomic thread is here:

Coach Soles I have read a few other things you have put out and one step you mentioned is winning the battle against club soccer. Do you have any tips on how you went/go about doing that beyond the general things you do in order to show you are a successful program. I coach in an affluent area where a majority of the truly talented athletes play club soccer where the club coaches force them to sign contracts that they won't play any high school sports. Even appealing to the parents doesn't get very far as they all believe this is how their child is paying for college.

curioushscoach wrote:

Coach Soles I have read a few other things you have put out and one step you mentioned is winning the battle against club soccer. Do you have any tips on how you went/go about doing that beyond the general things you do in order to show you are a successful program. I coach in an affluent area where a majority of the truly talented athletes play club soccer where the club coaches force them to sign contracts that they won't play any high school sports. Even appealing to the parents doesn't get very far as they all believe this is how their child is paying for college.

Depending on the culture of the area you are in, it can be very difficult. Sometimes it takes a small victory to start to win the battle. Some things to consider.

1. Is the athlete a better soccer player long term than they are a runner? If the answer is yes I will not pursue them and tell them to focus on soccer as that is where their future is. I had to do this with a very talented soccer frosh girl this year that wanted to try to do both. She is already being looked at by Stanford in soccer and is legit. No matter what magic I work with her, I'm probably not trumping that and I don't want to interfere with the true path she has. I do have her in my track conditioning class so that she can stay fit, but she won't ever be on my actual teams because her path is soccer.

2. Focus your efforts on the kids that are not great soccer players and may have more flexibility to leave the sport. Sometimes this is hard to tell, but usually the other kids can tell you who the studs are and who the ones are that are not going to make it long term. Frosh/Soph soccer girls are the obvious ones because if you aren't good enough to make varsity as a frosh girl in soccer, you may never make it.

3. Offer a better product than soccer does. If they get to travel with you, get cool gear with you, get camp, team sleep overs, pasta parties, and success in your program then they are more likely to want to try and stay with you. If you do a 10 min warm-up, 30 min jog, and some pushups each day and your team finishes last and only focuses on dual meets and real big invites, then why would they want to stay? Breakdown what they get by being in club soccer. Where do they travel? What gear do they get? What team activities do they do? Why would they leave a great program to go to one that isn't better and is more work? You have to compare what they get in soccer and offer more on your teams. The key is getting them out in summer and making sure they fall in love with your program during that time, otherwise you may lose them to the dark side.

4. Work with club kids their 9th grade season, but let them know you will eventually expect them to choose one or the other. Athletes doing both won't last and will breakdown. You will win some and lose some but the more you win and the better they do, the more you have to reference for future parents.

5. Gather data. How many kids are going to college on Scholarships through you vs. how many go through soccer. In our area, kids have a better chance of getting a scholarship through me than through soccer. If you can show them that on your team you have a chance.

At the end of the day parents will put their kids on the best team with the best future. Your job is to make sure they know that team is yours, and to back it up with results when you get those athletes.

Doug

Unfortunately, most of the schools in my city, including the one I coach CC at, have a different coach for the track program. My region is 11 high schools, 6 do the half and half method. Myself and the head coach for CC tried to explain that consistency is the best for the runners from season to season. The AD hired a new head track coach and this coach brought in his buddy that has run a 5k before. Yes, a 5k. This past summer and into the fall we had to retrain the team because of the previous track coach only had them doing 10-15mi a week. The other CC coach and I both applied for the head track spot but the AD wanted a teacher that knows sprinting because they would know how to bring the numbers. After rebuilding the CC team, we were able to win cities and regionals. Now we are looking to redo what happened last summer. I know the kids, and parents, were hoping we would get the head track spot but unfortunately, nope.

How can you convince the AD that consistency for the team is best? I am currently looking for a school to coach at that doesn't do the half and half method. Is there something we as coaches can do to help our runners when they are under another?

Thanks in advance.

I'm wondering how these coaches interface with parents. We live in an age of entitlement like no other. Every one of the above schools is characterized by high-earning, high-performing families who can be the greatest, most supportive partners for the team on earth when things are going well, or snippy, judgmental, arrogant twits when their little one can't be called "elite" in some way. (I teach and coach at a private school that is probably worse than any of these places in this regard.) So who manages the difficult parents at these programs? The parents? The AD? The principal? All three? Would love to hear some stories if there are any.

Spot on, Coach Soles. We have won almost all the dual sports battles with good athletes because we have a good product at Loudoun Valley; kids want to be part of a successful program whether it is Loudoun Valley or Great Oak. We have had Varsity players from several sports quit their "main" sport to be part of the track team or Cross Country team even though they do not make the Varsity in one or both of those sports. I think a lot has to do with youth sports burn-out. Kids have had enough soccer, lacrosse (big in our area), etc. and just want to try something different, fun and challenging. In our first year of coaching at Loudoun Valley, our top 7 girls (State Runner ups that year) were ex-soccer players and only one continued to play soccer...all the rest continued to run.

You can sell your program to a point but you have to be careful (and Coach Soles alluded to this) about the athlete that is exceptional at two sports. My philosophy is to expose them to our sport(s) and the culture we have developed, and then let them and their parents decide what to do. I do express that if they really want to excel at running, then they need to commit after their freshman year. Both Drew and Jacob played basketball their freshman year and, without pressure from Dad/coach, they chose running on their own. I currently have an athlete on the team that is a National-level kid in another sport. If I read the tea leaves correctly, he enjoys running more but is already at such a high level in his other sport that I am reluctant to push him toward running. I have had several talks with the parents and we both know, at some point, he will have to make a commitment one way or another...you can't serve two masters.

To help with dual sports kids who try to run and play club during the same season, our County has a policy that a school sport takes priority over a club sport for practices and events, and I let parents know that I fully support this philosophy.

So, in conclusion, build a successful program/culture and "they will come".

Coach Hunter. Email me at wejo@letsrun.com and I'll give you a moniker like Coach Soles.

Coach Hunter:

I started a thread earlier that didn't get much response. You mentioned basketball. Can a kid (Girl specifically) reach their running potential by running XC and outdoor track while training in the summer but playing basketball in the winter?? A big part of me thinks yes, a break is good for the body and mind and its not like a break sitting on the couch, they would be playing basketball all winter. Another part says thats 8-12 weeks where they are not training and their competition is... Would love to hear your input.

a dad wrote:

Coach Hunter:

I started a thread earlier that didn't get much response. You mentioned basketball. Can a kid (Girl specifically) reach their running potential by running XC and outdoor track while training in the summer but playing basketball in the winter?? A big part of me thinks yes, a break is good for the body and mind and its not like a break sitting on the couch, they would be playing basketball all winter. Another part says thats 8-12 weeks where they are not training and their competition is... Would love to hear your input.

I'm not coach Hunter but my brother ran 14:30's for 3 miles and 9:04 for 3200 while playing basketball in the winter. A kid older than him at our school ran 14:20's for 3 miles. It can be done. I do believe they both ran a little during the basketball season however.