I'm not saying small schools are the only ones who triple and quadruple up their athletes...but it's more of a problem at smaller schools, I've noticed. Also, I don't think you really understood what I was getting at when I was talking about smaller schools. I mentioned not wanting to coach track at a small school because one coach cannot effectively coach a track team. It is impossible. There are too many athletes and too many events for one coach to handle on his/her own. The school I teach at is 1A and they have one track coach, with no paid assistants. I help out here and there, but, being a fifth year teacher, I'm not willing to work on a daily basis for free at this point. Kids are left to their own devices many times, at no real fault of the head coach here, who is very competent, and most of the smaller schools in our area operate similarly.
Also, I disagree with you that triple and quadrupling your distance athletes is OK, even at state. Look at the states who are more successful than Iowa. Very, very rarely do you see athletes doing that. However, it is very common in Iowa. Part of the problem is it's relatively easy to qualify for state in Iowa, compared to many other states. A big reason we don't see any national level performances on the distance side of things is because, when tripling and quadrupling, we don't have kids really going for it. They are saving something for the next race. And why are they running the three or four races? For the team. Running for the team in this manner, in my mind, sells the individual short. The goal of a coach, I feel, should be to have his/her athletes perform at their optimum abilities. They cannot do this with tripling and quadrupling in distance events. And while I can somewhat forgive the tripling and quadrupling at state, even though I'm not a fan of it, I think it is downright ridiculous to have distance athletes doing it on a typical basis at unimportant invites throughout the season which happens far too commonly at all levels, 1A through 4A. And, again, this only happens to pad team scores because it surely isn't helping the athlete progress.
This post was edited on 4/20 11:22 PM by leonardsmith