Chieftan's Championship Quest

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141

Well said!!

I’ve read, watched and studied every product ever sold on this site, many times over. Every time there is always something I have missed or forgotten about.

My first year at this school I didn’t know anything about hurdles training. When the coach left, I was left to learn it, and in walked a talented kid who needed someone to help. I remember several conversations with you and message exchanges, along with a few other coaches and in two years, he became one of the top HS hurdlers in the US. I must have spent hundreds of hours reading, watching videos, studying races, talking to people. It wasn’t easy, but helped develop my coaching abilities further!

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Saturday: Indoor meet

Goals for today: let distance girls compete a bit, see how well the sprinters are in speed endurance so I can arrange relays for first outdoor meet.

My female hurdler G did well, making the finals, running 10.34 and 10.03. With many issues to address technically, I’m choosing to go after take off position. Just doing a few drills between rounds made a big difference, as time indicates.

In the 4x400, no one ran spectacularly, but showed I have some girls with potential to be competitive in our area, but likely not 3:57 range. I need to find a 4th girl, right now I have 3 solid girls and some good enough 4th runners to win meets in our league.

Distance girls ran hard, a few were sluggish from a hard 2 weeks of training. I consider a day like today training. Not worried about time, just a solid effort. I also like them to experience race tactics as well. Each race poses a different situation that will help them in future races.

Weather prediction for week is cool on Monday, warming up on Wednesday with possibility of rain, and then cooling again. I want to do one more time trial for the sprinters, maybe an 80 & 180. I don’t like to use race distances as experienced girls will freak out once they see their times, if I choose to let them see. Otherwise it’s just a speed endurance day for them.

I also have to work relay exchanges as my 4x100 and 4x200 crews are 3 members new this year, only 1 returner in each.

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gary winckler?

I’m joking.

(based on one of the videos)

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Monday March 23
Temps were in 30s. Did Big circuit with team. Most could get through about 80% of it before it got hard. Only a few are fit enough to do the entire thing.
Distance: endurance run plus Vigil 100-200 acceleration run as “strides” after.

Tuesday: March 24
Temps, low 40s but warmer air
15x100 tempo. Hurdlers did our basic set of drills.

Distance did 4x600 at 800m pace - 4 seconds slower with heart rate recovery.
Younger distance did broken 600m of 100+200+300 with 50m jogs between runs and 100m jogs between sets.

Wednesday: MArch 25
Temps: 50s, slightly cool air.
Since the team is so young, I had to do some time trials today to determine relay teams for next Tuesday. We did an 80m and 180m. I don’t like using race distances from a mental expectation point of view of the athlete.

Hurdlers did some work on drills.

We also had a bunch of kids try high jump out. I only have one high jumper so it’s important to get at least 2 more to help score points.

Older distance girls did 60min on gravel trails near school. The younger distance bunch did 40min and strides.

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Thursday:
Was cold day, kids did tempo on turf again. Many complained of feet aches and medial shin pain.

I had the relay girls who were at practice that day work on batons. We made a lot of progress in that day. But one girl missed because of a doctor appointment.

Distance did easy run. My mom usually watches my 2 kids during the day but was sick, so I stayed home. I had 2 older dstance girls on the team come watch my kids so I could have practice with the rest of the group, since they could get their run in afterwards.

Friday: Even colder: Temps 25-30, wind child less than 20F.
Not best temperature but in Michigan there are possibilities we will run in temps this cold. We did extended warm-up, talked about how to warm-up in weather that cold, and did easy tempo run.

Distance workout was a KitKat special 6x200, but with the temps so low, we changed to easy run and a few easy strides to avoid any potential quad pulls.

This group is unique from previous years because so many are not fit at all. My plan is to keep working on tempo and use races as main stimulus each week. In past, I would have had them running hard 2-3 days a week.

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Monday: Crazy day. Temps in 50s, very very windy

With all the madness of being the head coach, we were scrambling las tminute to get uniforms ready to hand out today. The other coach got into a car accident, she’s ok, car isn’t. During the day, the other team talked about re-scheduling our meet due to bad conditions of their events. After the accident, we just postponed it.

I tried to take advantage of the wind.

Distance: 10x100 all out on turf field, 2 minute recovery.

Sprints: 4x10m block starts (hurdlers did a few reps to H1)
3x 25+20 finish drill (hurdlers did 3H with wind at back).
1x60m all out

One girl hustled back from a student council weekend trip.
We did 5x10m standing starts working on mechanics to set up the long jump approach.
Then she did 300+150 in 50, 23.

I’m having a hard time giving my 100% to any one group since I’m doing everything. I thought I could do it but it’s hard to piece things perfectly each day. If a few girls could step up as leaders it would help a bunch, but none have really done so. Also hard on them is the ones who are the leader types, are typically doing completely different sessions than the other girls who need the leadership.

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ESTI

Remember that perfection is the enemy of good and that frustration will continue to drive you. Don’t expect the athletes to step up. It’s not their thing or what they signed up for. Unless you want that or sell it per say or ask. Have you asked? I think you are doing a heck of a lot of good at the level you are at . And for those who really want more or different? Well, you have shown to offer that and set whom ever up to go somewhere next once their high school development is complete. The biggest hole from our sport’s perspective is in early development. A lot of what you are doing is 100 x better than what is going on anywhere even when there is coaching.

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Charlie was able to share with others who he learned from and what it was that he learned from those individuals. This is not always a practice repeated by others and the profession of coaching might advance more rapidly if the ego took a bit of a back seat to performance , knowledge and getting things done properly. In the end, the performance and or the consistency of performance speaks volumes ahead of other matters.

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Tuesday

Temp: 50F, turf was covered in slush, as we had 2-3 inches of snow last night, but was 50 by 3pm!

Sprinters: Worked on the Piasenta hurdle drill to work on technique.
3x200 with 200m walk rest (~3 minute rest) (one girl, a 4 year senior who will run 200/400 did 5x200 in 33 with 200)

Distance:
Most did 2 miles hard/time trial (unofficially, but use the term to get a solid effort), a few advanced girls did 2.5 and 3 miles.

Handed out uniforms after.

150

Wednesday: Active recovery day doing our stations of foam rolling, hurdle mobility, stretch straps and joint distractions.
Distance: a few girls did a long harder run of 8 miles in about 60 minutes (one did it in 56)

Thursday:two groups Distance plus my long sprinters did 350, 300, 250, 200, 150, 100, 80, 60, 40, a slight variation of KitKats early GPP 400m work.

The short sprint group did a 200m type session of 200 + 4x60, 150+3x60, 100 +2x60 (walk back rest during the set, 5 minutes between sets).

Friday: Most of the kids are now on break. I had about a dozen sprinters show up. Without being rushed due to other sports using the field area or poor weather etc, it was nice to slow things down, do some more teaching and correcting than I normally could do.

Piasenta drill x 3

10m Block starts. The girls are becoming more comfortable in them today. It’s always fun to see the early season learning curve. I also had time to work on the girls positions in the blocks.

Hurdlers did a few drills working on lead leg, as most want to swing it out to the side to get it over the hurldes. The new long jumpers were working on flight technique of the arms. We ended with another Kitkat session of 2x (4x150: tempo, fast, tempo, all out). Rest between runs was jog, walk, jog, 5 minutes.

The kids on spring break are communicating with me for sessions while they are gone. As stressed as I get about them all leaving, I understand as it’s part of their high school experience. What is frustrating is that our dual meet season is 5 meets, and 3 of them will take place in the first 9 days back from break due to re-scheduling our first meet plus the other two that were already scheduled.

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Another positive note is my top distance girl has committed to run at the University of Houston next year. If anyone follows running will know the coach is one of the most respected and sought after on the lecture circuit as well. I felt he was the best fit for her transition to college based on her training background and learning about what he does. This is my 5th year coaching track and each year I’ve coached a runner who has gone on to run at a NCAA division 1 school. Very proud of the kids but it is them who do the work and trust the process. I have/had kids run at Harvard, Oakland University, Central Michigan, Penn State, Syracuse, and now Houston, in addition to one at a local community college.

152

With the weekend off and week off from teaching, I had some time to stay up late after the kids went to bed to review/re-read some of the products on this site. I dug into the Key Concepts Elite (now part of the coaching bundle) chapter on “High Intensity Training.” Since I deal with high school kids, essentially beginners, I’ve had to figure out things for their level. It’s taken many seasons and I’ve done better, but still have a ways to go.

Anyhow, this section is absolutely incredible. If I have time this week maybe I will do another mini article on the “take aways” from it.

If you read my journal, and don’t have the coaching bundle, it’s worth every penny…Go get it ! =)

153

Monday: Team had off, a few girls on break are running on their own with things I Sent them.

Tuesday: 50s, cloudy, cool air, but great day.

A few younger distance girls showed up, we did broken 800s (300-300-200) with 1 min jog (100m) at their goal time for this year (3:00). They are all 3:10-3:15 currently. They did great. They will race Friday in a 9th and 10th grade meet.

Sprinters and other came later on.

We worked a bit on drills. I spent the evening watching Charlie’s South Africa videos as reminders. It was great I’m glad I did. We then moved to a sled pull run. I wanted to go light but it didn’t work well at all. I have tires and used them instead. The effort was much better. We did some standing starts working on the first few steps. Most of the girls are landing too far in front right from the gun. We then did some block starts. I was able to double check their leg angles and hip height again, and they feel so much better coming out.

We then moved to some vertical posture work on the Piasenta drill with hurdles.

We finished with 2x 30+20 finish drill (30 buildup, 20 fly).

Hurdlers stayed a did a few starts to 4H. I thought my sophomore girl was going to race Friday, but she told me after the workout she will be gone !! Arhhhhhh.

Here is video of her race 2 weeks ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjknPqJwXNo (lane 4, tall girl)

Here is her today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnDfW8adCgw

Part of her issue I Felt was taking off too close to the hurdles and causing her to fly over too much. Since she is 5’10", I’ve taken the approach of training her like my boys by bunching hurdles in. We always train at 30" (my boys always did 36"). In the meet, her flight times were about .40-.43, today in training was 0.33. She got into the layout position much better too. What the main fix was so far, was the correct her block angles so she could take off at a decent distance from H1.

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What a substantial difference from video one to video two. How old is she?

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Grade 10.

It’s amazing how the hurdle spacing changed her rhythm so dramatically. Now we just have to continue this work. She’ is 5’10 and tends to over stride putting her too close in on take off.

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My first hurdle race was in the spring of grade 9. Up to that point I had never hurdled. I had a teacher who insisted I would be good at it so I tried. I ran the 60 meter hurdles in grade 9 and 10 and broke the Ontario provincial record in grade 9. ( that would be OFSAA).
The minute I had to do the 100 meter hurdles I struggled big time.( grade 10 I began running some 100 meter hurdle races) This coincided with other things as well. From a training perspective , I was getting further away from the gymnastics training I had prior to grade 9. I was still doing some gymnastics in grade 9 and 10 but not too much.
Had I understood at that time the importance of pushing the hurdles in and training with the hurdles low and pushed in, a great deal would have changed. I was getting too far away from routine strength and speed training that happens inadvertently from gymnastics. I was approaching puberty and I started training ( too much of the wrong type of work) 3 x per week with a group that was lead by someone who gave us smaller volumes of what she had been doing as a 400 meter hurdler , but the work was not specific enough, the volumes were silly stupid and NO SPEED work as I now know it.
From the first clip you showed me to the next one and now the video 2 weeks later you can see the impact of what you are doing with this young girl. Great job. SHe has no idea how lucky she is.
One of the most important things to do is regardless of your current plan and methods… KEEP A VERY CLOSE EYE ON WHAT YOU SEE. What you see rules first and foremost ahead of ALL THINGS.
The minute you see ANY degradation what so ever in her strength, technique, mood etc… shut her down.
SHe is weak and gangly and growing and needs lots of sleep… Remember , females need Different than their male counter parts. WHat that " difference" is , is for you to see and decide and analyze. I am not really telling you anything you don’t already know. I want to repeat it because most out there are not repeating what we know for sure. ( I see it constantly , hence my desire and push to keep this site and it’s information available).
It’s exciting to see what you are doing. I am excited to see how she will progress.

157

What a crazy week!

Today: Thursday April 16

Recap: Last Friday was a 9th and 10th grade meet. Conditions sucked. 20mph+ into the 200m turn. Was chilly as well.

It was a good experience for kids to get rid of nerves.

Weekend I had no practice. Most of the older kids were gone on spring break and were returning.

Monday: Team pictures, pre-meet practice. It was planned to be chaotic and was even more so when I had to leave practice to get my daughter and son because my wife had to take my other daughter to the ER for a nasty stomach virus and dehydration side effects. So I missed pictures, not a big deal, and the team tried to have somewhat of a practice on their own.

Tuesday: Meet. We won, and team did well. We had another head wind for sprints. Overall was very happy with performances.

Wednesday: Easy 100s to loosen up, foam rolling and stretching. I worked with a few new hurdlers and long jumpers as well.

Thursday: Meet again. We lost, first time in two years, and likely cost us the league championship, because I doubt this team we lost to will lose. I’m relieved in a way because to win more meets I’d likely have to over race my girls more than I’d like to. So far, I’ve had to race kids in 3-4 events, even distance runners. With loss, I’m going to back off and look for more quality performances. I considered this week a race and rest week.

A standout performance is my hurdler ran 15.2 HT. Unfortunately I have no video cause I was late to get to the bleachers and get camera set up. It’s #3 in our school history, and pretty dang fast for this area. I’m very proud of her.

My distance runner M had to race tactically for the first time. Other races are usually just timed trial type runs because she has been middle/front of pack runner. Now she will be in the front and things change when it comes to racing. She did well, winning both 800 and 1600, and ran a PR split in the 4x800 in sub optimal conditions, nasty wind and cool temps in high 40s.

Friday: pretty much just rolling and stretching. Distance kids will be biking in stead of jogging.

Saturday: A few older kids have a meet. Limited events for them of course. It’s relays only and the order of events make it hard to put girls in certain events.

Will update soon!

158

Friday was an easy day, of mainly rolling out and stretching. The kids, being very unfit, had a rough 3 days and 2 meets.

Saturday meet: Temps, 70s, beautiful!

It was a large meet with nearly 20+ schools attending. Most events were relays.

M, the distance runner, ran a new PR of 5:12.9 in the 1600, missing the school record by 2 seconds, which was the goal for the day. She came back with an 800 30minutes later in 2:27, 2 seconds off her PR, and then a 64 400 20 minutes later, another season best split for her.

There were many other great performances and I was very satisfied with their efforts. Most of the distance girls are able to do one event to their best level, and then the rest will not be so great. They don’t have much tolerance to that type of racing yet.

With the loss Tuesday, my intention is to not race kids as much, and look for them to give more quality efforts.

Not much to report on the sprinter end of things. A freshman girl ran a nice 300mH, her second time doing it this year.

There are nearly ten girls who have met the historical country qualifying marks. Official marks won’t be released until May but it’s nice to see where they are at and let others know what the aim for.

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Monday: terribly windy and cold. Team did a warm-up and stretching. Not much else.

Tuesday: Meet: 20+ mph winds (10 m/s). I changed the straight way sprints to have a tail wind, and it was not good. Kids stopped short of the finish line mainly. And the hurdlers didn’t do well at all, as I would have thought.

We won the meet easily, as the other team has girls who also play other sports and went to those sports instead.

With the bad wind, the girls ran hard and still turned in some nice times. Very proud of them, but a lot of work to do. This marked the 3rd-4th meet in 8-12 days for the kids. We have a few days of practice this week before another weekend invite. The non-varsity kids have 17 days left, varsity has 24 until regionals. Season flies!

Wednesday: low 40s, very windy, very cold. Tempo: 100m easy, push ups on one each, 100m easy back, abs on the other end. 10 x 100 total. Too cold and windy to ask them to go hard, so added the push ups and abs t get heart rate up a bit.

Hurdlers did some easy work with me, tomorrow we will do work on the track again. I spent some time with my long jumpers who have missed a lot of practice due to spring break and other after school activities. Their arm coordination during flight is all messed up and killing their jumps. But since spring break, today was really the first practice I’ve had with them, since April 1!! They did 4 laps walking around the field doing the coordinated arm action. I’m hoping doing it slow and many times can help without them having to perform so many jumps. On top of it today, the 8th grade had a meet and we couldn’t use the pit at all, so we did some jumps off an 8" box on top of the pole vault mats to help save their legs from impact.

Distance did a “longer” run for them, 30-50 minutes today depending on their age and background.

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Thursday: Most kids were running Friday, so they worked on a few baton passes and did some things to loosen up. It was low 40s and cold out. Not the best weather, and the kids were not super motivated to do much.

A few running Saturday. distance girls did 8x200 with 100m jog at goal mile race targets per 200m. This is not a taxing session for them, and I used it as a race model.

G, my hurdler, we worked on some resisted starts on Wednesday, and then Thursday tried to work on her frequency between hurdles. I used a 5 step, 5 step, 3 step 3 step drill, and G didn’t do well on it at all. She looked bad so I switched to 5 hurdles spaced in 2 steps, and she still looked bad so that ended the session.

Friday: The entire team competed this weekend at an invite. They got nearly last in every event, but when they finished their event, they had the biggest smile. They were all so nervous. Nervous about running fast, messing up the baton exchanges and things like that. I had some huge performances on the distance side. MY young 9/th & 10th 4x800 team all broke 3:00 for the first time this year. 2:50,2:51, 2:56, 2:58. Some had nearly 10 second PRs in this race.

M, my distance girl going ot Houston, had wanted to break the 3 distance school records we have. Two of them were set by current Brooks Beast Track Club member Amanda Mergaert (Univ. of Utah 1500m All-American). This meet had a 3200m and given the timing of the season, the weather, and potential field of runners, this was the meet she would go for it. She never races this event more than a “workout race” given her low mileage training, she would have a hard time being competitive in this right now. The field of runners was not great. One girl had a PR near the school record. Our plan was to even split all the way through (like we did in XC) and finish hard. She was on target for about 1800m and then started to fall off pace by a second every 200m. She was down 3 seconds with 600m to go and before the race I had told her when I yell to go you have to go, no hesitation. She took off running her last 600m in 1:50 (last 400 in 76) and broke the record by nearly 8 seconds running 11:24. Very proud moment for her and me as her coach.

Saturday I took a few older distance girls and hurdlers/sprinters to a usually competitive meet. G, the hurdler, had the fastest prelim time with an absolutely terrible technical race. In the 100m, one of my 9th graders advanced to the finals as well.
Hurdle prelims:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWOF7A5qVWw&index=16&list=PLzu5tlSaQ4em9_5y96hHtqsXjLdKnXHF4

During the break, G and I did some work on rhythm. I set up 4 hurdles tipped all the way down at intervals good for her. She did a few starts and saw nice improvements. We finished with a combination of tipped hurdles and finishing with 2 high hurdles. The tipped ones give her the rhythm into regular hurdles.

We did a few practice starts before her race and her take off mark was good, so I expected a fast time (at least better than her prelims). She won the race in a respectable time and had better technical execution. Her big issue is taking off too close and her flight path is more vertical than horizontal.

Finals: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1uf8OSQAdk&index=17&list=PLzu5tlSaQ4em9_5y96hHtqsXjLdKnXHF4

A few other girls ran well in the 400, 800 and 1600. In the 300H, G, ran a huge 2 second PR in low 50 second range.

Overall this weekend proved to be evidence of trying to get kids in good competitive environment for them to bring our their best effort.