Customer Reviews

Training for Young Distance Runners

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am a Cross Country Coach for Lakeshore Middle School in Stevensville, MI and am building a program. I found the "Training for Young Distance Runners" book to be very helpful. I have found the section on Psychology right on target. I have a son that runs High School Cross Country who runs year around and after a successful summer road racing season started the Cross Country Season doing very poorly. Using the Psychology section helped me get him back on track. The Nutrition section has also been helpful for some of my runners. I give the book a two thumbs up.

kandssteve@qtm.net Steve Nielsen

I liked how this booked emphasized how important mental training should be integrated into a good, solid training prog. The scientific aspect is easy to understand though not nearly as thorough or complex as Martin and Coe's book. The training is very conservative, but the strength training advice was very helpful.

Excellent book. Well written, and in the right vein for kids. Too many coaches today push these kids to the point of making them drop out of running. And worse, they ruin that kid for what could be a fun and rewarding activity into their adult lives.

This book covers in systematic order the pros of training and setting up a four-pronged approach to training and the cons of over training. I especially appreciated the coach examples of the schools that were included. The pictures are a good reference for all the stretch activities.

This is a must book for a coach who is working with this age group. They hit it right on the head and if you follow the guidance in the book, you'll turn out winners and lifetime runners - who have FUN!

Coach John

As a former high school cross country runner, the book Training for Young Distance Runner seemed to do a great job of providing a comprehensive overview of the skills needed to coach high school cross country runners. Greene and Pate offer advice on nutrition, running physiology, psychology and biomechanics for high school athletes. They book also covers training methods that improve the flexibility, mobility, and running technique as well as the proper amount of recovery time after hard workouts and competition.

As an adult runner, I only race once per month, but I remember racing several times per month in my high school days. This book will provide insight into running for high school runners, but adult runners can also benefit from the advice on creating a proper training microcycle and mesocycle. I loved the author's post-workout questions for cross country runners on page 171:

How are your legs feeling after an interval workout?
How is your breathing (during the workout)?
How did your technique feel on that last stride?
Did you like that workout?

These questions are valuable for me, because I tend to want to overtrain and overachieve in anything I set my mind to. Asking myself the right questions and listening to my body will help me prevent running injuries and keep my motivation to keep on training.

This book would also be valuable for parents of cross country runners, and a good reference for high school runners themselves. The book addresses running mesocycles and the impact of running on a child going through adolescence.

'Training For Young Distance Runners' is the best book I've come across for anyone interested in coaching young runners. In fact, I wish a lot more coaches would read this book, because it covers more than just training the physical, but also talks about running technique, basic physiology, adaptations to training, different racing strategies and the importance of motivation. Overall the training philosophy is sound, as it breaks training down into different phases. It covered the technical aspects of running without getting too technical, touches on specific components of running and training, and also steps back and looks at the bigger picture in regards to planning ahead and assessing results.

I can't recommend this book highly enough. If/when the time comes for me to be in a position again to coach young runners, I will use this book as a constant resource.

The book is very good but the title is a bit misleading as it is geared towards age 12 and up and not towards young runners 7-11 year olds. I do recommend none the less.

This book is a MUST for young runners, including their parents. Coaches would be so much better if they had their own copy.

I wasn't sure if I'd be able to get anything out of this book when I purchased it. It turns out it is filled with very practical information that the cross country team at my school can benefit from this fall. It was a wise purchase.

Great book, for coaches who are training young distance runners. Lots of ideas for the coach to build on as he navigates the pubescence years of both male and female athletes.

I've been running for 35 years and coaching for many so I expected to pick up a book that would give some insight into a young runner's mind or some biomechanical needs of a young runner. The book is a cursory view of coaching and training. It's fine if you are just starting out with no background. But where's the meat and potatoes?