Please delete this …
Rick
It is very common for young phenoms to plateau early and not make it at the senior level. Hopefully this doesn’t happen to Hannah, but it will be 6 years before she has a chance to make the Olympics. That is a long time.
Check out http://www.eliteyouth.com/index.asp to see who is the best.
I already seen those performances before Hannah ran…did’nt want to brag her up too much… he he 
Hannah’s numbers put her at #1 in the US in both the 100 and 200 meters, and it’s not even close.
As far as “plateauing” early, I don’t see that happening. Hannah has already been up at/around the #1 level for over 6 years.
I think to worry about that, you would have to do intensive training over a period of time, and the club’s workouts are not very intensive, and only 3 days a week.
Rick
Update:
100 meter dash Final:
Hannah Cunliffe @ 11.86 (with a -1.3 headwind!) beating the previous record time of 11.94 set in 1980!
Second place runner ran a 12.32
Later today is the 200 meter dash final…it will be interesting to see how much running the 100 meter this morning will effect her 200 meter performance?
Rick
I actually met her when she came down to miami at the nw classic. Everyone was like who is this white girl blowing everyone up. lol Yea she got some talent. check out Robin Reynolds
Very impressive…wonder why she doesn’t compete in USATF or AAU track, as I didn’t see her name listed?
She would be phenomenal in multi-events!
Rick
Update:
Hannah just ran the 200 meters
24.55 (-1.9 headwind) that is slower than her prelim earlier this week, and I’m sure that running the 100 meter earlier today effected her.
She still placed 1st, with the 2nd place runner @ 25.17 a little bit of a headwind there…
Congradulations Hannah, look forward to all the meets next year.
Rick
We’ll see. I understand you’re excited right now since she trains with your daughter, but you gotta take a step back and look at what often happened in history. It is extremely hard to predict performance at the senior level based on what they do in early years. A few examples:
Usain Bolt did it.
Marion Jones did it.
Donovan Bailey’s 18 year old PB was 11.37.
Jenni Hucul (white girl from Canada) ran 11.58 at age 15. She never really got faster, and switched to hurdles, PB of 14.08 at the World Juniors.
J Mee Samuels has a PB of 10.08 from when he was in highschool. He has been sprinting since then, and has NOT lowered his PB.
I have also seen a certain pole vault coach that turns out excellent high school vaulters, and year after year his vaulters get WORSE when they go to university/college.
dont know. I think her parents are messing her up imo. At state she won the 1 2 4 as a freshman. As a 8th grader she won the mid school states in the 1-800 meters. She runs damn near world class times in every event she runs. I think her parents are gonna burn her out.
I would think at that young of an age that the 800 meters could most easily cause her to plateau…
Just running short sprints and not training hard should not hurt her should it?
Rick
Depends on the qualify of the training. If it were up to me, I would keep her away from running anything other than the 100m and 200m for a few years.
You feel the 400 meters is negative for someone that young? My daughter runs the 100/200/400.
She ran the 800 in 6th grade, but I didn’t let her run it this year because of the plateau issue.
The 400 is my daughters most favorite event in the sprints…and she has one more year before High School…
Rick
If the goal is to develop the top speed necessary to compete at the highest international levels in the 100m, then training for the 400m (especially at her age) is likely to have a negative impact. Running 400m now and again at a meet is probably ok, but all of that speed endurance work will reduce her ability to develop the top end of her speed potential.
For your daughter, if she loves the 400m, then by all means have her train for it and run it. But be aware that this will make it unlikely for her to be able to compete in the 100m long term.
Pre-adolescent youths should not be exposed to excessive anaerobic lactic loads due to their immature physiology.
The stress of these types of loads is in excess of their ability to effectively tolerate them.
Possible and irreversible effects of this type of training may induce premature thickening of the left ventricular wall as well as finalizing the imprint on the percentage of muscle fibers that are, during the pre-adolescent stage, still plastic; thereby causing red fiber adaptations.
It is therefore in the interest of all pre-adolescent youths to participate in only anaerobic alactic training and sport game environments as well as low level aerobic environments.
Thus, many disciplines, over a wide range of sports, are contraindicated for youths at this stage (the 400 and 800m in T&F are on the top of that list as well as the cycling, ice, alpine, and Nordic events of equivalent bioenergetic structure)
A simple rule of thumb to follow with the training and sport game participation of pre-adolescents is to adhere to Charlie’s speed training philosophy in so far as minimal time spent in the medium intensity range.
Plenty of time to pursue anaerobic lactic disciplines once the requisite level of biological maturation is in place.
For these reasons, Athletics Canada has modified its distances for Midget (14/15). They do a 300m instead of 400m, 1200m instead of 1500m, 2000m instead of 3000m, and the 1500mSC has no water jump. Also, they do 200mH instead of 300mH or 400mH. They 800m has been left in place, but I sure think one of the girls I coach (15, still developing) who runs it in 2:18 is certainly taxing her anaerobic lactic system.
Hm…she will be very unhappy reading this thread…
How about hurdles? She started practicing 100 meter hurdles at the end of track season and she enjoys that too…
Maybe we could replace the 400 with 100 or 200 meter hurdles?
Rick
Dude, let your daughter run whatever she wants. Running the 400m at early ages doesn’t seem to hurt the Jamaicans.
Train for speed, play other sports, do a few field events and even run the odd 400m in a meet. Don’t specialize too early for Track and Field. Gymnastics and tennis, perhaps, but not track.
When I was competing in track, pretty much 95-99% of all the kids that were dominant prior to being 17 years old, particularly the females, were never heard from again by the time they were finished high school. Rates of development are highly variable and early success is no guarantee of success at full maturity.
I couldnt agree more with xlr8 and James. Granted she is young but still I totally agree that she should do top more speed events (100,200) instead of specializing.
However, running only 100&200 is some kind of specialization too…
I totally agree with NumberTwo. She should compete in wide variety of events to try her out and to develop her full potencial.
For example our national champion and the only “white” 2007 World Champ Finalist Matic Osovnikar was running 400m till he was 21 years old and came to 10,32 (100m) and then switched to 100m. He now holds a PB of 10,13. Running 100/200/400 in his childhood surely did not affect his speed development.