Training contains a fair amount of redundancy. Use that to
your advantage as a consistent means to compare and track progress. I know for
years I have used a consistent pattern of warm-up that provides me with instant
feedback on the athletes training readiness for that day. The same for certain
drills and workouts that I place at the same time in a training cycle. As the athlete
gains training age this information becomes increasingly more valuable.
The best basis for future planning is careful contextual
analysis of the prior training. Therefore it is very important to keep detailed
training records and logs.
Don’t always look for cause & effect, look for connections. Train the connections.
Use Foster’s RPE rating – Wait 30 minutes after the training session, have the athlete
rate the session on a 1 to 10 scale. Multiply that score by the minutes in the
workout.
Talk less, listen more. Speak with meaning. The power in
verbal communications often is not the words; it is the space between the words.
The rhythm & pacing, how you say what you say goes a long way to determine how and
if the message is received.
“Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and
dance. Great dancers are not great because of their technique, they are great
because of their passion.” Martha Graham
Jonathan Hewitt
My favorite saying about passion is this:
“Passion without direction is like the winds in the sails of a boat without a rudder, bound to crash upon the rocks.”
Not sure who said it first.
Ryan West
How do you keep detailed training records and logs? At this point, I am writing down the mileage, duration and intervals my distance runners do on a daily basis. I make notes regarding any injuries or when I modify the workout but I feel like that still doesn’t tell the entire story of the practice. With 50 distance track kids, it is difficult to keep records on them all and still monitor the actual practice. Ideas?