The Career Endurance Coach Coach Scott Christensen
The Career Endurance Coach By Scott Christensen Stillwater Senior High School When one has been a high school track and cross-country coach for the better part of twenty or thirty years, there are many people who claim you as a friend. There are former athletes, parents, coaching colleagues, acquaintances from your town, as well as many others that you have crossed paths with over the years. The vast number of people that you have come in contact during a career is staggering. And then there is you and your well-being. How well and with whom have you placed your trust during this extensive career? Coaching endurance runners is a lonely profession. It is not what it appears to be from the outside. Your role as a tactician, motivator, organizer, and disciplinarian is the core of what you do. To last many years in an era when the average career for a head high school cross country coach is less than five years nationwide is a notable accomplishment. There have been many psychological and social studies on why people leave coaching. If you analyze why people leave, it will help you better understand that you are not alone in your feelings. Both understanding why people stay in the profession for an entire career may be fascinating to any coach and so will comparing the many commonalities among the survivors. There must be some sort of support network in place that allows some people to last so long, while claiming others so early in their career. Family, friends, and other coaches must form a motivational and psychological basis to support the endurance coach who spends many weeks of the year with the running teams. It becomes not what you do, but what you are. The Stillwater, Minnesota boys track team has had one head coach for the past 26 years, me. Besides my biology teaching, I coach the boy s distance runners in cross-country and track. I have enjoyed great support from my high school administration and teaching and district coaching colleagues. Outside of my own school things have usually been positive as well, but not always. There are a variety of reasons for this, with competitiveness and rivalries probably the major reasons. Unfortunately, the notion of taking short cuts to success is just not limited to athletes, but to q few coaches as well. Especially the coaches who feel immediate success are an 2
entitlement. I have also had the opportunity to teach at thirteen USATF Level 2 Endurance Schools and speak at many other state clinics. Besides the empirical science of training cross country athletes using sound physiological principles, eventually the discussion gets to psychologically handling the runners on your team and understanding motivation. A frequent topic is also how to balance the training lifestyle of high school athletes and the balance that a coach must have in their own life as well. With this in mind, I have compiled a short list of commonalities that I have noticed among the successful career cross country coaches that I have worked with. This list is based on nothing more then observation and interaction at the high level coaching schools that I give. In addition to the list I have added a few observations for each: 1. Successful coaches ask the most questions. Whether it is coaching, the business world, or whatever, the people with the best resumes seldom talk about themselves. They want to ask questions about what you do. They ask questions about your program, and your situation, how things affect you. It may not be because they are uncomfortable talking about all their success, more because they may be looking for anything you do that they may want to incorporate into what they do. There is just a natural curiosity there. Others usually seize the moment to brag about what they or their athletes have done or will do. We have learned to avoid these types of people. 2. All successful coaches have an ego. Now get over it. They may not talk much about themselves, but what they do say may seem a little strong to you. They have a strong level of confidence and are sure of themselves. This turns a lot of people off that do not want to work that hard. Others justify their own feelings by thinking they would not like to be like them anyway. Or, that their own program does not have the built in advantages of the successful coach. 3. All successful coaches look for the go button. Every human being is capable of being motivated. Athletes come to your team for a variety of reasons; the important 3
part is they have joined your team. There is not a go button that motivates all athletes; indeed there is a separate one for each. It is the coaches, not the athletes, job to find that button. Understanding each athlete s parents motivation may help, but the important piece is in understanding the athlete you work with every day. 4. Successful coaches know that motivation must follow science. In the United States we have the greatest sport specific scientific base in the world. Our biomechanical, physiological and psychological labs have the best scientists and technology. Yet, so many coaches of all disciplines fail to truly understand the science behind their sport. Endurance, speed, flexibility, strength and coordination are the components of every sport. When to apply concepts such as overload, recovery, and periodization must be designed and applied before we are ready to motivate the athlete to perform. The coach must constantly study the research material, subscribe to technical publications and listen to the scientists. This will help much more then copying what they do at the school down the road. 5. Successful coaches have more expectations then rules. Setting up rules is a big part of successful discipline. Many coaches go completely overboard with this, trying to anticipate all that could possibly happen, and setting up rules to address them. Obviously, there are societal and team rules that everybody must follow, but they are few. Everything else is based on expectation. Discipline and motivation is a very personal thing. Successful teams have athletes that have earned certain things due to their history of contribution to the team. The more they contribute the more trust and understanding that are earned. Everybody is not treated the same, fair is seldom equal. 6. Successful coaches never take ownership. My team, my runner, my program, these are all ownership statements. It is never my. That is not what a team is about. The coach is just one of the vital parts that must constantly be present for success. Too 4
many coaches imply and even say things that the athletes view as misdirected ownership. You own things, not people and teams. 7. Successful coaches know that professionalism costs nothing. To be a professional indicates that you are at the pinnacle. Your coaching career must be treated that way. If you treat it like an after-school activity, that is how it will stay. If you treat it like a profession it will be so much more. Coaching involves constant study, planning and improvement. Little things like how you dress, and how you greet and address people needs to be done as a professional. Athletes usually love their coach, because unlike their parents, the coach is always showing them new and different things. Do it as a professional. 8. Successful coaches never follow a compliment with a but. The initial contact the coach has with an athlete following competition is the main basis for their relationship. Compliments make a point, and criticism makes a point. Do not mix them into the same sentence. Most of the time you will give them something positive to walk away with, leave it at that. On the other hand, if the effort was poor, let them know immediately. If it was mostly good, the next practice will be a perfect time to add in the things that were not so good. 9. Successful coaches do not see problems, only challenges. Putting a successful team together is a great challenge, and you should treat it that way. The challenge is compounded with a public that feels they can do a better job. Like all challenging occupations, there will be problems. Focusing on the problems diminishes your ability to see the big picture, and thus make the crucial intuitive decisions that occur at every practice. To view something as a challenge, rather then a problem puts hope into your thinking and communication. The athletes will perform better with that mindset. 5
10. Successful coaches work in isolation. Your program is your program, a unique set of principles and expectations that are specific to your team. It needs to be studied, modified and kept updated. Research needs to be done. All of this calls for private and secluded work. In Europe, the best coaches have a small building away from their house that serves as a secluded office to study their work. Away from distractions, and other influences. The most important realization is the one you make that what you do is indeed unique. Not just a program that you copied from others. The endurance athlete meets their sport at the coach. You will have challenges to your professional, personal, and emotional existence if you choose to be a career coach. Success does not have to be measured in conference and state championships. However, these will follow after forming a strong base for your program. Distance running coaches should read the science of their sport, and they should also read about the lives of successful coaches outside of running. The principle for success, professionalism and preparation is best learned while not cluttered around training. It is about dealing with people as much as dealing with the sport. Success is something all driven people hope for. Winning is important, but not the only important thing. A coach does not have to win all the time, but they do not have to apologize for winning either. To Discover How to Run a Dominant Cross Country Program and to Learn the Training Secrets from a World Class Distance Coach Click Here >> 6