Club Teams

Click on the title above to see a good read. It has some really great insight to what the American distance running scene was like when we actually were winning international competitions. Well, that was until the major shoe companies had their say in it. The one thing I disagree about is the comment made about Title IX. Sure, it may have hurt American men's distance running, but it greatly improved American women's distance running. Sorry, but that decision has bettered American running as a whole. If you want to go on about how other sports cut into running (::cough cough:: football, baseball, basketball) that is another story.

All of this talk about club teams brings me to a point about the betterment of runners. I know many runners, especially young runners like myself, look at these elite training groups (i.e. Hansons, Team USA, McMillanelite) and think, "Man, I'd kill to be on that team!" And, truth be told, you probably would. In my eyes though, it seems to be "the rich get richer" mentality. The already good guys just get better. Now, in a sense that is what we need short-term, but long-term it's depth that we need. Yeah, yeah. I know. Many argue that this is the deepest field for the Olympic trials marathon than there ever has been. But, I wonder how stacked the other countries are. I saw a video the other day of when one of our Olympic qualifiers said that the 2:20 guys push the 2:15 guys, the 2:15 guys push the 2:10 guys and so on and so forth (note to self: find that video). That's what I think we need is that consistent depth, year after year.

I'm wondering about the ratio of track clubs (or running clubs) that are around versus when Bill Rogers and all of them were around. The article from above mentions that all of the great track clubs based out of Eugene, OR and many other places simply died out. Obviously, we as a country need these training groups so that our huge base of post-collegiate runners have somewhere and someone to keep pushing them to the top. To me there seems not to be enough, but I am going to research if that is true. I know there are a couple of pretty solid ones in New York. I actually contacted a few of them to see which group to join since I see myself going that direction in order to really improve. We all know how hard it is to get out there and do that extra 30 minutes of running when you are solo.

I'd like to hear from some people to see what your thoughts are on the topic of track clubs.

Training:
Thursday:
Duration: 00hr 33min 44sec
Distance: 4.5 miles
Comments: Easy run with the team to Pizza Hut (coaches treat for a good season). Over slept so I missed my run in the morning, but this was better since I needed an easy day. Felt good though.