Coaches Archives - Page 3 of 17 - High School Running Coach

Colin Altevogt – Bio and Key Workout

Colin Altevogt is the head boys cross country coach and assistant boys track coach at Carmel High School in Indiana. He has been coaching high school distance running in Indiana for the past 11 years. In his four years as the head cross country coach at Carmel, the team has captured two state championships (2015 and 2017), two state runner-up titles, and two qualifications for Nike Cross Nationals (2014 and 2017), including a tenth-place finish in 2017. The program has grown from 96 to 159 athletes in those four years.

In the spring, Colin coaches athletes in distances 400 meters and farther. Carmel has won the last three state championships (2015, 2016, 2017) in track & field after finishing second in

2014. In the 2017 season, Carmel athletes qualified for the state finals in Indiana’s single-classification system in all individual and relay events that he coaches, including winning the state title in the 4×800 relay in 7:43.

Colin teaches Spanish at Carmel High School and holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in secondary education.

Key Workout

Split 800s

This is a 500 and then a 300 with only a minute rest between run pretty close to 800 meter race pace. We usually do three of them in total with eight to ten minutes between each split 800 (but only the 60 seconds between the 500 and 300 to “split” it). We typically get to this workout about a month out from the state meet once we’ve had opportunities to do a couple 800 pace workouts like repeat 300s. Those preceding workouts make the speed of this manageable, but the volume is the real challenge.

This is primarily a workout for 800 runners—Indiana scores the 4×8 at the state meet—but longer distance runners and even 400 guys can benefit. We occasionally have more sprinter-types that run on the 4×4 and 4×8 so we might adjust their workouts to do the first and the third with a bigger break in the middle.

Last year we had four guys average 1:59 or 2:00 for the three split 800s, and those four ran 7:43 in the 4×8 at the state meet so it’s probably four to six seconds slower per 800 than eventual race pace. Our best 400 guy ran 1:57 and 1:56 for two with the big break in the middle, and he ran 1:56 in the open 800 in the regular season and 48.78 in the open 400 at the state meet.

by Jay Johnson

Dave Frank – Bio and Key Workout

Dave Frank is in his 18^th year at Central Catholic after eleven years at Saint Francis in Mountain View, CA.

As the head boys cross country coach (13 years) his teams have won nine State Championships (in Oregon’s largest classification – although CCHS has just 900 students) and have never finished worse than second at the State Meet. His boys have qualified for NXN three times (2005, 2007, 2013). He has coached four individual State Champions (Kenny Klotz – 2005, Taylor Morgan – 2006, Kyle Thompson – 2011 & 2013) and 19 First Team All State runners (63 total All State athletes). Klotz also finished 4^th at Footlocker in 2005.

On the track his boys have run 7:40.68 (4 x 800m – 3^rd at Nike Outdoors in 2006), 10:09.82 (DMR – 2^nd at Arcadia 2014), and 17:22.43 (4 x 1600m – 2^nd at Arcadia 2014). Klotz was the State Meet champ at 1500m & 3000m in 2006. Morgan won the 800m in 2007, and Andy Bennison won the 1500m in 2011.

He was the assistant coach from 2000-2004 and had a front row seat to Galen Rupp’s high school years.

Key Workout

Washington Park Fartlek

Years ago – in the 1980s, long before the Oregon Project or the Bowerman Track Club – there were many outstanding post-collegiate runners in Portland. Most of them raced primarily on the roads, but each year they also ran the XC Nationals (which is now known as USATF Club Nationals). To prepare for XC Nationals they began a weekly fartlek workout in Forest Park (miles and miles of amazing trails). When I came home in the summers I’d join this group for this *challenging* workout.

When I returned to coach at Central Catholic a group was still doing this workout – although less regularly. I considered using it with our team, but was initially deterred by the effort it might take to implement it properly. After conversations with a few people I saw the light, and it’s been a staple of our summer program for over a decade now. [Read more…]

by Jay Johnson

John O’Malley on Culture and Planning

What follows are two excerpts from John’s full interview, available to Season 2 members, of HSRC. You can listen here or on the Run Faster Podcast. The transcription of the interview is below.

Jay Johnson: Can you give me two or three things you do in your program that you think you would see in all successful cross country and track programs. Could be from a coaching standpoint, or from a team standpoint, like “here’s what our team is doing or what I personally do as a coach.” It could be something like – the importance of consistency in training. We’ve had other coaches say hey you really need to get kids you know out for our sport that that if you’ve got 20 kids on your team versus 80 kids and your team you’re going to have a much better shot of being successful if you’ve got 80.

John O’Malley: Yeah. It’s really cool hearing those answers and the question didn’t even occur to me until ask if it’s just a coaching question or team questions and I have I’ve asked it in that way. So that’s really clear that you segmented it that way.

I think some things that we do that is simply learning from other programs and getting exposure to other great programs. I think first of all every great program has a plan. The plan can work differently but there’s plans in place and there’s organization well before you your first moment of action, your first practice and I think great coaches do that. I think great programs have had that kind of a plan that doesn’t mean necessarily if they stick to it 100 percent and I think that would be counterproductive if it did.

But there is a plan in place and there is a plan in place for racing and training and mental/psychological training and things like that and cultural things with your program and how you’re going to develop the program. So I think there’s there’s a lot of planning involved in any great program. The best coaches I’ve seen are the ones who are constantly learning and have constant dialogue whether it’s with their own staff, if they have a staff, or other coaches around them and are just perpetually learning and really work hard.

You know I think sometimes people forget that to build a program, to build great runners and to be a great coach you really have to work hard. It’s not like you get to a certain level and then that’s just going to perpetuate itself. You’ve got to work hard all the time. I think that the best programs have a balance of of having accountability and being tough and rigorous and challenging and also have the human factor. You know the fact that they’re teenagers and they’re developing and growing and they often come to us as freshmen will know no background in running or very little background or running or something like that. And we balance that with you know those things and what it means to be a part of a team and what it means to grow from freshman year to senior year and as a person. And those those elements are clearly a part of a great program. [Read more…]

by Jay Johnson

A HSRC member’s take on Timo Mostert’s training philosophy

This guest post is by Doug Petrick, a member of HSRC, and the boys and girls track and cross country coach at Upper St. Clair High School, in Pennsylvania.

If you follow high school running, no doubt, you’ve heard of American Fork High School, coming straight out of Utah. This past spring, American Fork’s 4x1600m boys relay team smashed the National Federation of High School’s previous record by over 10 seconds! When you do the math with their record time of 16:41.30 for the event, it works out to 4 minutes and 10 seconds for each 1600m split leg!

In fall 2015, American Fork finished second as a team at Nike Cross Nationals (NXN) and had the individual boy’s champion. This past fall, American Fork repeated as the second overall team at NXN and had three runners in the top 10 individually- along with the individual winner in the boy’s race. This is quite the model of successful high school distance running, and the coach orchestrating all this success is Timo Mostert. [Read more…]

by Jay Johnson

A HSRC member’s take on Dr. Jeff Messer’s coaching philosophy

This guest post is by Doug Petrick, a member of HSRC, and the boys and girls track and cross country coach at Upper St. Clair High School, in Pennsylvania.

“One of my primary goals…is to do everything I can to make sure every girl who comes to our program has the opportunity to run at a college or university if she wants to, and run better at the college or university than she did in high school. Because if she doesn’t continue to improve, I feel like I’ve disserviced her.” Anyone that truly understands distance running, should hold a similar long term view of training high school athletes. Dr. Jeffrey Messer of Desert Vista High School, without a doubt one of the best high school coaches in the US, shared his long term view of training on High School Running Coach.

As a member of High School Running Coach, I’ve had access to Dr. Messer’s training and philosophy for success. Dr. Messer has had numerous accolades over his tenure at Desert Vista. One example is in 2013 his girls cross country team won the Arizona state championship- quite a feat. During the Spring of 2014, the Desert Vista girls distance program was ranked as one of only two programs in the “top ten” groups in the 800 meters, 1600 meters, and 3200 meters. During this past cross country season, Desert Vista finished sixth as a team at Nike Cross Nationals. Even more impressive is the fact that Dr. Messer’s runners have continued to flourish as runners beyond the high school setting.

One of the keys to his success is using the opposite of what most coaches would call periodization. While at Desert Vista High School, Dr. Messer created a culture that stressed the importance of working all energy systems year-round for his runners. Always on the cutting edge of sports science, Dr. Messer has allowed his methods to evolve to get the best out of his runners in an intelligent way. Strength training is another critical element that has led Desert Vista on the path to distance running success. Not only does Dr. Messer know the science that backs up incorporating strength training, but understands how the ordered placement of strength training exercises within a session can be be manipulated to achieve maximum results. During the podcast on the site, he goes into detail about the importance of this timing at the physiological level. Since Dr. Messer states that, “distance runners are in the business of building mitochondria,” he also places a high emphasis on the long run for his athletes. Long runs are structured to allow each runner to progress over the course of the fall season, and continue improving that stimulus year round. [Read more…]

by Jay Johnson

A HSRC member’s take on Coach Adam Kedge’s progam

This guest post is by Doug Petrick, a member of HSRC, and the boys and girls track and cross country coach at Upper St. Clair High School, in Pennsylvania.

Albuquerque Academy has won 23 New Mexico High School State Championships in cross country and track and field. To have that level of consistency and success in High School Sports is a major achievement. By having a membership to High School Running Coach, I am able to learn about the culture and training that Coach Adam Kedge has used at the helm of Albuquerque Academy. Through the site, a podcast, training calendar, Q&A forum, and key workouts are available for members. These are all ways I’ve been able to learn from Coach Kedge, one of the premier high school running coaches in the US.

Coach Adam Kedge of Albuquerque Academy has a gift for creating a culture that breeds success. Kids in his program love running and the atmosphere around the team. One reason for this is his approach; Coach Kedge always makes decisions based upon the best interest of the kid as a person first, then as an athlete second. As a result, the Chargers of Albuquerque Academy strive to perform for Coach Kedge.

Small incentives are another way he uses to keep things fun at practice and races- whether it’s a shirt for hitting a milestone or a verbal acknowledgement in front of the group. Being singled out in a front of your peers for a positive achievement is a powerful tool to build an athlete’s self-esteem and build your program. Little things like this keep the Charger culture alive and thriving. Everyone has a place on the team, regardless of ability level. [Read more…]