When I was being recruited to college, I was often asked, "Why did you choose to go to Iowa State?" I usually responded promptly, "the coach and the team." I felt as if the coach and the team were the best fit for me of all of the schools that I visited. I fit in best with the team and thought we had similar interests and social activities. I liked the coach and her training program. I thought her training style matched well with the type of training I had done in high school. In addition, I liked the feel of campus.
Now, entering my senior year, naturally many of the original Iowa State team members have graduated, and the summer after my freshman year the coach who recruited me, took a job somewhere else, and Amy Rudolph became my coach.
Even though the leadership and members of the Iowa State team have changed, I am having more fun than I could have imagined, and I'm reaching times I only dreamed of as a freshman in college. I really like working with Coach Amy, and my new teammates are just as fun and caring as the ones I started with my freshman year. I am so thankful for the distance culture at Iowa State University and the relationships I have built with coaches and teammates.
While experiencing three coaching changes in three years, I learned more about training and the coach-athlete relationship. Even though each change took its own adjustment phase, I am so thankful for each of them, and happy to be where I am now, carrying out my current training plan from my current college coach.
Here is the training I did this week. This was the last week in which we kept our mileage up while doing some track workouts. Next week, we will begin a short taper phase to prepare for our time trial coming up at the end of next week.
Monday: 13 miles
AM-9 miles
Post run: Core
PM-4 miles
Post run: Strides, stretching
Tuesday: 10 miles
Warm up-3 miles
2 x 2 miles with 3 minutes recovery
Cool Down- 3 miles
Wednesday: 10 miles
MW long run, nice and easy
Post run: 10 min. core, stretching, yoga, lower lumbar stabilization drills
Thursday: 12 miles
AM-8 miles
Post run: Core
PM-4 miles
Post run: Strides and stretching.
Friday: 10 miles
Warm-up: 3 miles
Rhythm 400m
14 x 400m, 90 seconds recovery
Cool-down: 3 miles
Saturday: 13 miles
13-mile long run
Post run: stretching, in-home gym routine
Sunday: Off Day
In middle school, I was coached by many of my teachers, but my head track & field coach was my math teacher Nate Clevenger. He helped to foster my early love of the sport of track & field.
Throughout high school, I was coached by Matt Logue. This coach-athlete relationship has been different than any other and so special in many ways because my father was also my coach. He was the only coach I who had first-hand knowledge of how much I was resting or where my energy was going. He could see my day-to-day activities and he knew my personality tendencies better than I knew them myself at times, as he had been watching me grow up for 18 years. My father was a distance runner who was also coached by his father, and he knew what it was like to be on both sides of this relationship.
When I signed to Iowa State University, my freshman year I was coached by Andrea Grove-McDonough who now coaches at the University of Toledo Ohio. This picture was taken right before my first college race.
Currently and for the past two years, I have been coached by Amy Rudolph. Hopefully we will be together for at least two more years! This picture was taken after the Big 12 Championships my junior year, with Coach Amy (middle) and my teammate, Abby Caldwell (right).
This is Coach Amy and I after NCAA Cross Country my junior year. It was a wet, cold day, but it was so much fun. It is a day I will never forget because I was able to spend it with my teammates, family, and coach.
In my time training as an athlete, I have had four different cross and track coaches, each with his/her own training programs, ideas, and methods, and each with his/her own personalities and strengths. As one would expect, each coach is very different from the other. However, being coached by all of them helped me progress as an athlete and as a person.
You may have heard the phrase, "Many roads lead to Rome," meaning there are multiple methods or approaches to reach a common goal. I have found that all of my coaches helped me succeed. When considering different coaching strategies, training plans, or relationship dynamics, I have learned that there is not only one way, but many ways to improve as an athlete and many different ways to be an effective coach.
With that being said, it is important to note that having a knowledge-based coach is important, and some training strategies may be proven to work better for some than others, but it has been my observation that different doesn't have to have a bad connotation. Despite all of their differences, there are some common threads I found in all of these relationships that I think have been fundamental to a healthy coach-athlete relationship.
Here are some of the commonalities I have found important in all four of these coach-athlete relationships:
"Buy-In" or Trust from the Athlete:I've had coaches who made my training more anaerobic than aerobic, coaches who prioritized strength and sharpened only when necessary, and coaches who emphasize race strategy while others prioritized pace. Through my own personal experiences, I have found that by believing in my coaches and their training or "buy in" to the programs, I have achieved my goals in multiple ways and not a single training strategy has risen above the others as better or best. They all worked. While some of this is situational, it was important for me to realize that even if my training wasn't exactly what had worked for me in the past, there was no guarantee that a new way of training wouldn't work too. I personally feel fortunate to have had multiple coaches and exposures to different ways of training, as I believe it made me a more well-rounded athlete.
Someone once told me, "As an athlete you should believe that you are in the best program in the country." This doesn't necessarily mean that others don't have training programs that are just as effective as the one you are in, but if you have a proven knowledge-based coach, you would be foolish to think that somehow, other programs are much better.
This statement reflects more on our attitude toward our coaching than the actual methods. I would be foolish to tell you that physiologists and coaches have not already spent years refining and sharing the best training methods. However, if I didn't trust in my training and I didn't trust in my coach, I would have a hard time continuing to carry out a training plan or a strategy that I couldn't believe in. It would negatively affect my ability to have confidence in myself and my program. I have found that trusting in my coach, believing in the plan they have for me, and following it to the very best of my ability is very important. Many different coaches in the NCAA take different approaches on training and many have success.
Communication Between the Athlete and the Coach:Once I put my trust in each of these coaches, it was important for me to communicate with them. None of them could read my mind (not even my dad). Only I could tell if I was fatigued or if I was in pain, and it was my job to speak up if something was wrong. Coach Amy repeatedly tells us statements along the lines of, "If you had to stay up studying for a test last night, I need to know about it." I've found that the importance of notifying a coach at the first indication of injury, or when an event or decision has occurred that may affect training, cannot be underrated. A coach prescribes a workout assuming an ideal training state, so if anything has occurred to disrupt this state, I have to tell them. Communication dealing with injury or disruption is not the only important communication. Communication is also important so training can be adjusted as needed. Coach Amy has asked, "How are you feeling?" following a hard training session to see what training should be like going forward. After a hard effort, she will ask if we are feeling flat or heavy so that she can adjust our training accordingly.
I've also learned not to underrate the value of just sharing general information with my coach. At times, I have thought to myself, "My coach doesn't really need to know this information because it's not about my training or racing." However, I've learned that building a relationship and allowing a coach to learn about me, even if it's just what I enjoy, what my family's been up to, or what I value, can help a coach to learn more about what motivates me, and this helps build a relationship with that coach and lets him/her know more about how I think and who I am.
Ownership of Success and Failure by both the Coach and the Athlete:Both coach and athlete deserve credit when the athlete succeeds, and they should both assume some blame when the athlete fails. In my career, I have seen athletes who don't want to own their failures. When something goes wrong, we all have a natural tendency to want to blame someone else. As an athlete, I have learned to evaluate myself to see what can be changed and then do my best to correct my mistakes. An athlete needs to use their coaching to get better. We expect coaches to adjust to athletes and develop a program that allows athletes to reach their maximum potential. Athletes should also be held responsible and should execute their coach's program to accomplish the same goal. If something goes wrong in training or racing, adjustments must be made in varying degrees by both the athlete and the coach.
What is a Coach? (Note: I left my computer unattended, and this was written by my HS coach...lol).
True coaches have a passion for the sport they are coaching and the athletes they are working with. They coach because they want their athletes to have rewarding, enlightening and memorable experiences. Coaches are prepared to share their knowledge in an attempt to teach athletes lessons that will allow them to thrive in competitive environments. They are not perfect. They want what is best for their athletes, but any veteran coach can tell stories about athletes they impeded or about athletes they could not help to their potential. However, these same coaches can often tell stories about athletes that far exceeded their expectations and that went on to have experiences they never dreamed these people would have. A great coach helps their athletes grow regardless of that athlete's level of success.
(Okay, back to me writing now. Good job, Dad!)
Most importantly, coaches are people. If you think your coach may have made a mistake here or there, you could be right. However, I have found that rather than being so quick to turn the blame to others, it is good for me to look internally at myself. I ask myself, "How did I handle that situation?" or "What could I change going forward to adjust to this in the future?" Just like I have made mistakes, so have the coaches I have worked with. Being a coach does not give one the ability to see the future or to control the actions of others. My dad would be the first to say he could've changed an aspect of a race here or there and maybe have gotten a different result. Just as I, as an athlete, show up and give my best effort every day, so have all of the coaches I have worked with. Because of this, I cannot appreciate them enough.
Therefore, when I think of all of these relationships, it would not be fair for me to expect my coach to work a miracle. I have found that athletes with a coach with good fundamentals and knowledge-based training, can be successful in many situations. I realize it is my belief in my coach and in my program, that can make all the difference. As an athlete, I need a coach to guide me, but, at the end of the day, it's my running career, and I have to do my very best with the talents and gifts I have been given. It's common in our culture to fire a coach when the team isn't having a winning streak or to blame the coach when an athlete hits a rough patch and struggles; but at times, I think we may be making a mistake. In panicking and bailing, we get can get in the way of our own development. Sometimes patience and time can reveal more than we knew before. Sometimes I think we would do ourselves some good to treat coaches and athletes with patience and grace and realize there are many roads that can lead to Rome.