I am preparing to do an internship within the next year as an Exercise Science student and wondering if there are any good internships out there for prospective Track coaches that follow a good philosophy and have a good program. Preferably in the USA, let me know if there are any you guys know of
Depends how far you’re willing to travel, as almost all of them will be unpaid. I did one at SPIRE institute, however, to be straight to the point, the program there is very old school (lots of “medium” running, lack of true speed work, etc.) Still a large facility and lots of exposure to athletes from across the world. You may want to take a look at Eastern Tennessee State University. I have heard good things about them from a few people on this forum. They host a US Olympic Training Site (as is SPIRE). I would have done it there but it was just too expensive to move there as SPIRE is less than an hour away from me. I would also recommend going into education if it’s not too late, for me I will admit I have regrets going into exercise science, as I didn’t learn a shred about real training in class. An education degree opens up your employment opportunities to the high school or middle school level, if you enjoy working around youth athletes. Just my two cents there
If you want to deal in fitness or exercise or sport than do it. Find a way to make it work. Having formal education is never bad. It might not be efficient or practical or specific but so what. Welcome to real life. Find ways to make it work for you. I’ve been lucky but also willing to do what ever we needed to do. I’ve seen many coaches and athletes in my life and I will tell you the silver lining for us has been meeting those people in our lives as a result of Charlie losing his career. That might sound like I am trying to sugar coat things and maybe I am. The fact is that Charlie was one of the best coaches in the world ( to date imho) but no one would hire him. Things began to turn around over time with lots of hard work and then guess what. He got sick and died. Oh dear. Poor us. Get over it all of us. SHit happens and you simply can’t let this stuff matter in the grand scheme of things. Do you really think Charlie wanted to do personal training? Well, you may not know the man and I am not saying anything bad about Personal training as I have made a living from it in part. I insisted on us at least making what we were doing pay for itself to buy us time to get back on our feet. The world moving ahead is going to be owned by those who are more creative not less creative. Charlie forbade me to formally educate myself. Now while I can tell you this is messed up in some regard, it was his way of insulating me from certain profs who disliked CF intensely.
Decide what you need and want. Two tasks some of you may not understand yet. For me it was brain dead easy. I wanted to run and I wanted to run fast and not much else mattered. Everything else was all second for me.
For Charlie, he cared about track and he cared about making people faster than all others. For him all other things were second.
and then happened 1988. Whoops.
What are you gunna do now?
cry?
Go get what you need.
Go get what you want.
YEs there will be bumps.
What would I do ?
I’d go ask USC coach. Hey need a hand? And then go make it happen.
I’d go ask John Smith the same.
I might go ask a few other people doing their own thing and then learn what ever I could.
Ranting again I know but there is lots of info in there. A lifetimes worth.