Do none of the big club have links with local football teams? I bet there are lads, who won't make the grade at football, but would make great distance runners.
Don't schools send their talented kids to clubs any more? I was sent to a local athletics club as a kid, but the track was within a velodrome and I ended up getting poached by the cycling club instead!!
You're right. At our local inter-schools cross country, three of the first four home in the year 4 race were members of the junior footie team that I coach....the Keeper won it. :thumbup:Originally Posted by Dynamo Dan
A few years ago, my daughter's school got to the final of the English Schools Cross Country Cup. The Year 7/8 Girls was won by a girl from Harrogate who plays for Leeds called Leah Galton who still plays for Leeds but no longer runs the XC that I can see.
There's another Lancs girl who won the County Schools Inter Girls XC last year who is a footballer.
But my experience is that the football coaches are delighted for them to train with us until around 13-14 for fitness, they are reluctant to let them compete and as they get beyond 14 they actually block them competing.
I have many experiences of football for boys and girls where the athlete is told that :-
1. If they miss the football training they will not be considered for selection.
2. If they are selected and don't go, even if on the bench, they will not get selected next time.
It's a real pressure - a pressure that we do not exert on our athletes.
To what end as well? The vast majority get thrown on the scrap heap and playing for a pub team.
Does athletics have to get more ruthless? I don't like the idea of it, but I also don't like being used.
Take the example of a young footballer, been with us for 2 - 3 years. They have yet to take part in any club race. Always the excuse is a match or training. Yet on a Saturday morning at 12:30pm just before Xmas (the same time as our league XC races) that same athlete was able to compete for the school in the Town Schools XC Champs.
Coincidence that the only 2 Saturdays between October and March for 2 seasons so far have been the town schools where football has not been an issue.
I bet they manage to run at the County Schools a week on Saturday as well.
It makes me feel like a mug sometimes.
Yep, we get a bit of that too (at the track). To be honest, I can't really blame the kids and enjoy working with them even if they are not allowed by their footie team to compete. I know that it upsets some of the Harriers coaches though.
WP and MOTM thats about choice on one level but its also about bigger forces. The lure of the big money. My middle son is a decent footballer and I have done some fitness work with his team of u13 who havent a clue to be honest. They have been conditioned already into believing that they are going to be successful (rich) footballers and behave as such. Some of his team are for the most part rude and untalented and supremely unfit yet and deluded. Its sports such as football and to be honest I cant really think of another that have the control. If a kid does both athletics and football then they will chose football every time because they are told to not just by coaches and parents but by society we are constantly told of the high life footballers and theyre wags live which is sadly pushed as something to aspire too. Its hard to challeneg that "choice"
"Moors are a stage for the performance of heaven"
Indeed. I know parents who have ££s for eyeballs already as their child football star is "Signed" to a Premiership club.,,,aged 9!!! He is very very good, but, heavens above...he's 9. He can no longer play Junior football with his mates or with school. It stinks.
I'd love to see athletics holding some glamour again (was Nick Rose ever that glamorous??? not sure) but I'd hate for the sport to end up as dominated by the promise of mind-boggling riches as football is. However, it is shuffling in some middle ground between amateurism and professionalism at the moment...perhaps the Corinthian spirit has been lost somewhere, whilst the opportunities for at least earning a crust at the sport are still limited to a small pool of athletes worldwide.
Look at road cycling though. It only takes for one or two home nations athletes to rise to the top and suddenly everyone wants to know. Maybe, if the Brownlees win Gold we'll be inundated with young tri-athletes wanting to improve their off-road endurance running. Mo mania might take hold. Jenny Meadows/Paula might get it right this time.
One thing I do know is that the children at the track are generally pleasant, polite kids...like you say CCR, that can't always be said of the footballists.
TBF running anywhere other than the track and Xc can upset some coaches. I do feel that some athletics clubs and coaches can be too much for the team and not enough for the athlete. Team success should never outway the needs of the individual
"Moors are a stage for the performance of heaven"
I think I said something similar earlier. With regard to the "some coaches" comment, as you know I work with a coach who has an outlook that might be interpreted like that....however, I know that his "reasoning" has the individual athlete very much at heart, not the club....whether we agree with him or not.
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