Killer coaches (highschool idots)

[Chris6878]

So Im coaching again this year on the HS level. Last season I had complete control of the sprinters with no head coach interference. took a kid from 12.1/25 to 11.5/22.6 with a year of correct training. This season the old head coach became the school AD. He offered me the HC job, but I dont want to deal with the admin and other bull that comes with HC. I just want to deal with the athletes.

So he gave the job to this other coach who is known for running kids into the earth. He thinks he is a sprint coach. Ive known this guy for a few years, and I always noticed his kids always being hurt. From the start of the season to the end.

So training started in October. THe kids have been on the track from October until now. Last week he put them in spikes, he made them run in spikes every single day this week on the track. Mind you, the track is horrendous. Last week He had the entire team play touch football on the field. (i guess thats grass day for him)
I was like WTF. One of our best sprinters rolled her ankle. I told her to sit down. He sends her back out, hurt ankle and all. SO you have 60 kids, girls and boys on a field running around playing football.

Ive been trying to save the kids as much as I could. His volume is astronomical, so I usually will take off 5-6 reps off runs (for ex, 6x300, then 5x120 fast in the same workout)

Yesterday I couldnt take it, when our best hurdler got hurt. Me and the coach got into a heated debate. I told him kids need to get off the track and not be in spikes everyday. He says no, he is a professional coach. lol I says atleast spread the work out, monday hard, tuesday easy, wed hard…He says not mon and tuesday are latic days. WTF. Then he goes back to pro shit. He says, these are john smith workouts, I say no they are not and john smith trained with charlie franics…THis guy says who is charlie francis. At this point I say fuck it and walk off.

The kids thought we were about to fight, but at the same time they were looking at me like please save us.

SO far his workouts go from 240-630 everyday! At 5pm I leave. He just makes shit difficult for no reason.
His warmup include 2 laps joggin, with a couple drills, then static stretching. After that, jump right into the workout. When Im there I have the kids stride the first run.

Workouts for this week (spikes on track everyday)

Mon-older sprinters-2x400 split run 300,100 wide open then 10x50m runs (I cut it down to 4 when he wasnt watching) Young sprinters-10x200, I made them do 6.
Weight room-3x10 for all-upper body day-bench, push press, high pulls, bicept curls, pull downs, split jerk press, dips.

Tuesday-all spinters-4x200 timed (girls 26 sec,boys 24) no one made the times.
Weights leg day-3x10 all-squat jumps with a 10 under each foot. (WTF), bench squats, leg press, leg ext, leg curl, jump split squats

Wednesday-COne drills and plyos on the track. relay practice 4x100 finished with a wide open 4x1
no weights (I assume this was an easy day) Also the kids look like shit over the cones and form wise cause he refuses to work on technique. Just run baby.

Thursday-4x120, 6x40. Hurdler pulled his ham.
WEight room upper body day from monday.

Friday-relay funday…enitre team shot putters included run a relay which includes 200,200,400,800. (I told one of the shot putters to just go home before they ran. He has also been making the shot putters run miles at practice)
weights-repeat tues leg day.

I never stay for the entire workout cause 4 hours is too much for me to handle.

So after talking to this crazed Jamaican coach who refuses to do any tempo on grass, I am done talking to him.
My goal this season is to keep as many kids as I can from getting truly hurt.

This will be my final season coaching. I will only coach again when I have full sprint control.

[kwave]

There are so many track coaches, but good ones are few.

BTW, are there no law/regulation in place that limit the number of hours coaches can hold practices for student athletes?

[James_Smith]

@Chris6878

So Im coaching again this year on the HS level. Last season I had complete control of the sprinters with no head coach interference. took a kid from 12.1/25 to 11.5/22.6 with a year of correct training. This season the old head coach became the school AD. He offered me the HC job, but I dont want to deal with the admin and other bull that comes with HC. I just want to deal with the athletes.

So he gave the job to this other coach who is known for running kids into the earth. He thinks he is a sprint coach. Ive known this guy for a few years, and I always noticed his kids always being hurt. From the start of the season to the end.

So training started in October. THe kids have been on the track from October until now. Last week he put them in spikes, he made them run in spikes every single day this week on the track. Mind you, the track is horrendous. Last week He had the entire team play touch football on the field. (i guess thats grass day for him)
I was like WTF. One of our best sprinters rolled her ankle. I told her to sit down. He sends her back out, hurt ankle and all. SO you have 60 kids, girls and boys on a field running around playing football.

Ive been trying to save the kids as much as I could. His volume is astronomical, so I usually will take off 5-6 reps off runs (for ex, 6x300, then 5x120 fast in the same workout)

Yesterday I couldnt take it, when our best hurdler got hurt. Me and the coach got into a heated debate. I told him kids need to get off the track and not be in spikes everyday. He says no, he is a professional coach. lol I says atleast spread the work out, monday hard, tuesday easy, wed hard…He says not mon and tuesday are latic days. WTF. Then he goes back to pro shit. He says, these are john smith workouts, I say no they are not and john smith trained with charlie franics…THis guy says who is charlie francis. At this point I say fuck it and walk off.

The kids thought we were about to fight, but at the same time they were looking at me like please save us.

SO far his workouts go from 240-630 everyday! At 5pm I leave. He just makes shit difficult for no reason.
His warmup include 2 laps joggin, with a couple drills, then static stretching. After that, jump right into the workout. When Im there I have the kids stride the first run.

Workouts for this week (spikes on track everyday)

Mon-older sprinters-2x400 split run 300,100 wide open then 10x50m runs (I cut it down to 4 when he wasnt watching) Young sprinters-10x200, I made them do 6.
Weight room-3x10 for all-upper body day-bench, push press, high pulls, bicept curls, pull downs, split jerk press, dips.

Tuesday-all spinters-4x200 timed (girls 26 sec,boys 24) no one made the times.
Weights leg day-3x10 all-squat jumps with a 10 under each foot. (WTF), bench squats, leg press, leg ext, leg curl, jump split squats

Wednesday-COne drills and plyos on the track. relay practice 4x100 finished with a wide open 4x1
no weights (I assume this was an easy day) Also the kids look like shit over the cones and form wise cause he refuses to work on technique. Just run baby.

Thursday-4x120, 6x40. Hurdler pulled his ham.
WEight room upper body day from monday.

Friday-relay funday…enitre team shot putters included run a relay which includes 200,200,400,800. (I told one of the shot putters to just go home before they ran. He has also been making the shot putters run miles at practice)
weights-repeat tues leg day.

I never stay for the entire workout cause 4 hours is too much for me to handle.

So after talking to this crazed Jamaican coach who refuses to do any tempo on grass, I am done talking to him.
My goal this season is to keep as many kids as I can from getting truly hurt.

This will be my final season coaching. I will only coach again when I have full sprint control.

Sadly I worked with a similar idiot head coach my first and last season coaching scholastic T&F in 2005, only to discover just how commonplace this sort of incompetence is all the way up through the professional and Olympic level.

I had it out with him during a regional meet. He came to me in the office the following week and apologized and I told him I couldn’t believe he was permitted to be the head coach (despite how well the team had done under his tenure).

Just one more piece of evidence that irrefutably demonstrates the possibility of exceptional sport results in spite of incompetent coaching. The vital ingredient being athletes who are talented enough to compensate for their coaches lack of knowledge.

[Highlander]

This is the 10235458854th reason why I refuse to Coach high school Track. I lose count how many high school kids I train during the year and they all say " My coach wants us to run Cross Country to get ready for Track Season"
But there’s been a few parents who have said “This doesn’t make sense… Why does my child need to run far to run fast”
But guys… Trust me. I see this at the Collegiate Level… Meaning D1 level…
1 School got mad at me cause I told several Parents/kids not to go there cause they don’t have a “Real Sprint Coach”

[rainy.here]

@Chris6878

Workouts for this week (spikes on track everyday)

Mon-older sprinters-2x400 split run 300,100 wide open then 10x50m runs (I cut it down to 4 when he wasnt watching) Young sprinters-10x200, I made them do 6.
Weight room-3x10 for all-upper body day-bench, push press, high pulls, bicept curls, pull downs, split jerk press, dips.

Tuesday-all spinters-4x200 timed (girls 26 sec,boys 24) no one made the times.
Weights leg day-3x10 all-squat jumps with a 10 under each foot. (WTF), bench squats, leg press, leg ext, leg curl, jump split squats

Wednesday-COne drills and plyos on the track. relay practice 4x100 finished with a wide open 4x1
no weights (I assume this was an easy day) Also the kids look like shit over the cones and form wise cause he refuses to work on technique. Just run baby.

Thursday-4x120, 6x40. Hurdler pulled his ham.
WEight room upper body day from monday.

Friday-relay funday…enitre team shot putters included run a relay which includes 200,200,400,800. (I told one of the shot putters to just go home before they ran. He has also been making the shot putters run miles at practice)
weights-repeat tues leg day.

What the f—ing f—? I wish you were joking. This is possibly the worst program I have ever had the misfortune to see. Sorry to hear this.

It reminds me a of coach in my region who used to work with sprinters/hurdles age 15-20. This coach was part of a 250 person club and coached sprinters/hurdlers. The workouts tended to be mostly, high volume, and always high intensity. This coach always had very fast early season times, followed by injured athletes mid or late season. However, because the club was big enough, there were always a few who hung on long enough to put up really good times before getting hurt, which somehow led to the occasional perception that this coach is good at coaching… so a post-secondary institution hired this coach, and now this post-secondary institution’s sprinters/hurdlers are being put through the same hamstring-injury treatment.

[Chris6878]

@kwave

There are so many track coaches, but good ones are few.

BTW, are there no law/regulation in place that limit the number of hours coaches can hold practices for student athletes?

Im sure there is, but I know football practice is damn near always 4 hours, which is why I stopped coaching…I put in 2 hours at this practice and then I leave cause the last 1.5 hours is him having them in the gym wasting time. THe whole practice time is wasted actually. after his wack warmup, he will have them sit around for 15-20 mins while he I assume decides what to do.

[Chris6878]

@James_Smith

Sadly I worked with a similar idiot head coach my first and last season coaching scholastic T&F in 2005, only to discover just how commonplace this sort of incompetence is all the way up through the professional and Olympic level.

I had it out with him during a regional meet. He came to me in the office the following week and apologized and I told him I couldn’t believe he was permitted to be the head coach (despite how well the team had done under his tenure).

Just one more piece of evidence that irrefutably demonstrates the possibility of exceptional sport results in spite of incompetent coaching. The vital ingredient being athletes who are talented enough to compensate for their coaches lack of knowledge.

Funny cause we have a girl who can run forever. THey had her running the 800 her freshman year before I got there. Last year I put her in her natural event the 400. She can be awesome, but I have a feeling he will run her into the ground, even though she rarely gets tired.

In fact his daughter is a 400 runner at missouri. Every year in highschool she had a pulled ham, and still made it to states each year. His son last year, was hurt every year.

[Chris6878]

@Highlander

This is the 10235458854th reason why I refuse to Coach high school Track. I lose count how many high school kids I train during the year and they all say " My coach wants us to run Cross Country to get ready for Track Season"
But there’s been a few parents who have said “This doesn’t make sense… Why does my child need to run far to run fast”
But guys… Trust me. I see this at the Collegiate Level… Meaning D1 level…
1 School got mad at me cause I told several Parents/kids not to go there cause they don’t have a “Real Sprint Coach”

I dont send sprinters to my alum because of this now.

@rainy.here

What the f—ing f—? I wish you were joking. This is possibly the worst program I have ever had the misfortune to see. Sorry to hear this.

It reminds me a of coach in my region who used to work with sprinters/hurdles age 15-20. This coach was part of a 250 person club and coached sprinters/hurdlers. The workouts tended to be mostly, high volume, and always high intensity. This coach always had very fast early season times, followed by injured athletes mid or late season. However, because the club was big enough, there were always a few who hung on long enough to put up really good times before getting hurt, which somehow led to the occasional perception that this coach is good at coaching… so a post-secondary institution hired this coach, and now this post-secondary institution’s sprinters/hurdlers are being put through the same hamstring-injury treatment.

lol ham injury treatment…speaking of that. He takes the hurt kids to his “guy” who cant even tell if kids are hurt or not. THe hurdler’s hamstring is swollen and the therapist said he cant tell if its pulled or not.

[voges]

Those are terrifying volumes! Unfortunately, for many coaches volume is seen as a badge of honour and the odd survival story validates their beliefs. The soft tissue stuff is just the tip of the iceberg. The structural damage in the form of tendon damage and stress fractures is always just around the corner with these guys. It’s like sending a kid out to play football without a helmet,just irresponsible

[bmarcho1]

@Chris6878

So Im coaching again this year on the HS level. Last season I had complete control of the sprinters with no head coach interference. took a kid from 12.1/25 to 11.5/22.6 with a year of correct training. This season the old head coach became the school AD. He offered me the HC job, but I dont want to deal with the admin and other bull that comes with HC. I just want to deal with the athletes.

So he gave the job to this other coach who is known for running kids into the earth. He thinks he is a sprint coach. Ive known this guy for a few years, and I always noticed his kids always being hurt. From the start of the season to the end.

So training started in October. THe kids have been on the track from October until now. Last week he put them in spikes, he made them run in spikes every single day this week on the track. Mind you, the track is horrendous. Last week He had the entire team play touch football on the field. (i guess thats grass day for him)
I was like WTF. One of our best sprinters rolled her ankle. I told her to sit down. He sends her back out, hurt ankle and all. SO you have 60 kids, girls and boys on a field running around playing football.

Ive been trying to save the kids as much as I could. His volume is astronomical, so I usually will take off 5-6 reps off runs (for ex, 6x300, then 5x120 fast in the same workout)

Yesterday I couldnt take it, when our best hurdler got hurt. Me and the coach got into a heated debate. I told him kids need to get off the track and not be in spikes everyday. He says no, he is a professional coach. lol I says atleast spread the work out, monday hard, tuesday easy, wed hard…He says not mon and tuesday are latic days. WTF. Then he goes back to pro shit. He says, these are john smith workouts, I say no they are not and john smith trained with charlie franics…THis guy says who is charlie francis. At this point I say fuck it and walk off.

The kids thought we were about to fight, but at the same time they were looking at me like please save us.

SO far his workouts go from 240-630 everyday! At 5pm I leave. He just makes shit difficult for no reason.
His warmup include 2 laps joggin, with a couple drills, then static stretching. After that, jump right into the workout. When Im there I have the kids stride the first run.

Workouts for this week (spikes on track everyday)

Mon-older sprinters-2x400 split run 300,100 wide open then 10x50m runs (I cut it down to 4 when he wasnt watching) Young sprinters-10x200, I made them do 6.
Weight room-3x10 for all-upper body day-bench, push press, high pulls, bicept curls, pull downs, split jerk press, dips.

Tuesday-all spinters-4x200 timed (girls 26 sec,boys 24) no one made the times.
Weights leg day-3x10 all-squat jumps with a 10 under each foot. (WTF), bench squats, leg press, leg ext, leg curl, jump split squats

Wednesday-COne drills and plyos on the track. relay practice 4x100 finished with a wide open 4x1
no weights (I assume this was an easy day) Also the kids look like shit over the cones and form wise cause he refuses to work on technique. Just run baby.

Thursday-4x120, 6x40. Hurdler pulled his ham.
WEight room upper body day from monday.

Friday-relay funday…enitre team shot putters included run a relay which includes 200,200,400,800. (I told one of the shot putters to just go home before they ran. He has also been making the shot putters run miles at practice)
weights-repeat tues leg day.

I never stay for the entire workout cause 4 hours is too much for me to handle.

So after talking to this crazed Jamaican coach who refuses to do any tempo on grass, I am done talking to him.
My goal this season is to keep as many kids as I can from getting truly hurt.

This will be my final season coaching. I will only coach again when I have full sprint control.

He sounds like the coach of the yr…I think you should take notes and utilize this immensely brilliant training… make sure to put time aside to visit the sprinters in the hospital…

[Chris6878]

So, I got to practice yesterday, and after they warm up, he has them stand around for 40 mins before he tells them the workout. After he finally tells them the kids spike up and the sprinters go set up cones. I walk down to the cones, and he tells me to go WATCH the distance crew. 3rd time he sent me away from the sprinters. I stand with distance for a good 5 mins then I say fuck this…I walk pass him, look at him and I jump in my car, rev the engine and peel out. I quit.

Not wasting 3-4 hours a day doing nothing. I call the AD, he starts laughing. He knew I wouldnt last long. The coach wants flunkies…and Im not the one.

[Stikki]

Sorry to hear that man. I don’t know why there is so much ego in high school track. I bailed on a bad head coach/worse assistants two seasons ago. If you can find the right school and/or head coach it can be incredible and super rewarding, but if not it can be hell.

[Oldbloke]

@Stikki

Sorry to hear that man. I don’t know why there is so much ego in high school track. I bailed on a bad head coach/worse assistants two seasons ago. If you can find the right school and/or head coach it can be incredible and super rewarding, but if not it can be hell.

Athletes at a club find it easier to transfer to another coaching/training group within their club or leave and train elsewhere. School students find it harder to walk away. Puts the coaches in a stronger/more dictatorial position.
I have found club coaches to be better educated, often through self study, and more open minded. They are usually unpaid, doing it for interest, the feeling of helping others and have no financial interest in outcomes. except at elite level.

[Chris6878]

@Stikki

Sorry to hear that man. I don’t know why there is so much ego in high school track. I bailed on a bad head coach/worse assistants two seasons ago. If you can find the right school and/or head coach it can be incredible and super rewarding, but if not it can be hell.

This same school last year was perfect. Head coach wanted me only to coach sprinters. Was glad I took it off his hands?

[Chris6878]

@Oldbloke

Athletes at a club find it easier to transfer to another coaching/training group within their club or leave and train elsewhere. School students find it harder to walk away. Puts the coaches in a stronger/more dictatorial position.
I have found club coaches to be better educated, often through self study, and more open minded. They are usually unpaid, doing it for interest, the feeling of helping others and have no financial interest in outcomes. except at elite level.

Well this idiot is also a club coach. Ultimate track club. Ive seen him for years and never liked his training. I hoped he would welcome change, but I guess not. He is a megalomaniac.

[sady]

Not what you know

[bantazmo]

@Chris6878

This same school last year was perfect. Head coach wanted me only to coach sprinters. Was glad I took it off his hands?

Chris I know we do not always agree on training but that weekly schedule the guy you say is in charge is beyond crazy. I would not do some of those things even with my 400/800 crew. No active recovery days, crazy volume to begin, and no sense of separating themes. Doing that many 200s with young kids is a dumb place to start too. Wow. I believe you should try and deal with the paperwork in the future so they can have a head coach with some sense.

Regards,

Ryan Banta

[Chris6878]

@bantazmo

Chris I know we do not always agree on training but that weekly schedule the guy you say is in charge is beyond crazy. I would not do some of those things even with my 400/800 crew. No active recovery days, crazy volume to begin, and no sense of separating themes. Doing that many 200s with young kids is a dumb place to start too. Wow. I believe you should try and deal with the paperwork in the future so they can have a head coach with some sense.

Regards,

Ryan Banta

well i have other jobs, plus competing myself leaves me no time to deal with the extra head coach stuff. I also work at another school, so I would think the HC is atleast working at the school during the day.