Red Hook, NY - We are competing in a curious time. It seems as if the higher echelons of our sport are competing against the traditional paths. While one of our harriers going pro is still the outlier, our top female harrier this year is coming off of homeschooling through her middle school years. In addition, our top male harrier has been competing for the club team Rolling Thunder since he was eight years old. And finally, the state's next rising talent, has been running CYO meets for years, coached by her father.
So does this mean that High School coaching is dead? Not even close. But it does raise some questions. Questions that have been raised before, when another Home Schooled athlete was the talk of the town. In 2005, Josh McDougal captured just about all long distance state records, culminating with a 8:48.11 for the 3200y, and a 14:07.55 for an on-track 5000m run. Now almost ten years later, the questions come back.
In 2005, one parent set out to answer those questions, submitting to TullyRunners an article entitled, "Josh McDougal is a Perfect Example of What is Wrong With High School Track." The parent's name was John Raucci, a father with two son's running for Red Hook High School. Over the next season, we will be re-releasing his original articles, which almost a decade later, prove fascinating. You can note, that some of the ideas are a bit dated, but some of the things are spot on, before they came to be the accepted standard. I hope you enjoy the article as much as we have.
Josh McDougal is a Perfect Example of What is Wrong With High School Track
by John Raucci
I was at the Albany First Night Run where my two sons Joe and Dave ran. After the race, two Bethlehem High cross country and track graduates, Pat Shaffer and Evan Savage, came up to me and started conversing. Both were injured and unable to run in their freshman year of college throughout Cross Country and now into their Indoor Track seasons. Pat, at that time, told me something that went through me like a knife. He said, "Josh McDougal is the perfect example of what is wrong with High School Track". I assumed he meant that, the High School system by which we train and compete, is flawed and ends up in the destruction of many kids' careers - especially the more elite runners. I train the kids at Red Hook and some from Rhinebeck in the off-season, and I have been doing so for the past 5 years, and I knew that Pat was correct. Now, Josh is beating people who were ahead of him two and three years ago by 2+ minutes. Recently, he defeated Alan Webb and came within seconds of Tim Broe in a nationally acclaimed 4K race. He has been relatively injury free although not entirely, but far better than the non-home-schooled kids. He seems to improve gracefully whereas many others seem to grapple with injury and/or settle for small performance gains. That at least appears to be the trend.
I decided that night that I must write this article as an offering to all runners, coaches, and parents of runners in New York. The purpose of this article is to make us conscious of issues that are at the moment a blip on the screen - those issues that I believe lay behind Pat's statement. This article is not written in conjunction with anyone else including Josh, nor is it endorsed by anyone at the moment. It is simply a compilation of my own thoughts, experience, and research over the past five years. Long distance runners are of a special breed. They work hard, and receive little recognition.
I live an hour south of Albany. On the three local news stations, there are consistent and daily videotape highlights of football and basketball. It took the Saratoga girls to win a National Cross Country Championship to squeeze out 10 seconds on the Nightly News - the only 10 seconds devoted to running that I saw all Fall. How much work did it take to win that championship? How many hours day and night, winter and summer, did those girls train on those lonely upstate roads? I bet one could not count the investment, the dedication. If such athletes cannot be given recognition at least in relation to their effort, I believe they should be given good information, the kind of information that will help them reach their potential. It is in that spirit that I write this article.
As I see it, there are five problems with the way we train our runners, not only in New York, but also throughout the nation. None of the five are easy to correct because running, like so much else, is encumbered by cultural standards that not only impede progress, but also lead us to sickness and injury. The five problems thrive because of our culture. In any case, bringing the five to light is a first step to health and realization of potential. The five are as follows: the problem of running shoes, the problem of breathing, the problem of anaerobic activity, the problem of nutrition, and the problem of mind/body integration.
Part 1: If the Shoe Fits - Beware of It
Last year, I spoke with Josh McDougal's father, Rob, about his sons' training. He mentioned that both Josh and Jordan trained in flats or lightweight shoes and on trails up in the North Country. They did not use heavy training shoes. This is very significant, as we will come to see. Not long ago I had a conversation with Marist College running coach Pete Colaizzo about the issue of shoes (my older son Joe runs for Marist). He mentioned that studies have shown that the more expensive, the more engineered, and the more cushioned the shoe, the more likelihood of there being a running injury. This really made sense to me. I had often been told by coaches and runners alike, that if you run too many miles, you get hurt. When I asked why that would be, I never got a clear answer.
Certain Native American tribes ran as a way of life - hundreds of miles a week, year after year. There were no reports of injury. So from that, I sensed that something other than the running is behind the injury problem. Native American Indians ran with bare feet or in moccasins that are essentially a thin but rugged material covering the foot. Moccasins allow foot muscles to flex in ways that modern footwear does not. In addition, Africans run without shoes (until they get really good and snare a contract from Nike).
At the Footlocker Regional two years ago, I spoke with NY Federation Champ Lopez Lomong. I asked how he trained in Africa. He assured me that it was without shoes. I asked him why he wears shoes now. He said, "It's the Law", meaning he was forced into shoes in order to run in High School. He was unhappy with having to wear shoes, but submitted in any case. If anyone has observed Lopez Lomong or Dominick Luka, it would be almost impossible to fail to recognize how efficient they both were and are. At the State Meet last year, Luka won in 1:51 for the 800 meters and Lomong in 4:10 for the mile. When they run, they appear rather to sail. They land lightly on the balls of their feet and spring vigorously from the ground with each step. Neither has a rapid turnover, but both have enormous strides. Their power comes from their feet. Their foot muscles are strong and well developed from their African heritage. Africans engage their feet while in motion whereas Americans are compelled to draw power from their legs that can never quite substitute for weakness in the feet.
If we recall, Hakon DeVries started off as the stronger runner in New York. But as his High School years went on, injuries took their toll and the Africans came up powerful in the end. Prior to the Footlocker in 2003, I spoke with Hakon and his coach and asked that they look into the issue of barefoot running. At Stanford University where Hakon would eventually attend, reports circulated that the Cross Country team was beginning to incorporate barefoot running into their training. I have not yet seen confirmation of that practice, but, Nike in conjunction with Stanford designed the Nike Free shoe, which was "supposed" to mimic barefoot motion.
Hakon relied upon orthotics after his first stress fracture. I have never seen a case whereby orthotics has helped a runner, but I have seen about 20 in which injuries to runners were multiplied after the use of orthotic inserts. Orthotics are meant to correct an obvious misalignment. They can fail because making one adjustment does little when a whole system of muscles, tendons, joints and ligaments are out of whack. By correcting one problem, the entire system is often thrown off worse than before.
What then precisely is the problem with shoes? I mention shoes here because that is where the problem begins. For many reasons, the human foot was designed to come into direct contact with the ground. There are many nerve endings in the foot, which are in effect massaged when touching the ground, thus bringing a benefit to virtually every organ in the body. Shoes prevent us from feeling the ground. In addition, they cramp toes and weaken foot muscles whose function is thwarted by the shoe. When the muscles in the forefoot are weakened, we lose our ability to spread our toes. This forces our feet to overly rely on the mid-foot muscles, which in turn draw heavily upon the ankles, and so on up the leg. Should there be a heel (any size heel on a shoe), the entire body is misaligned; calf muscles are forced to shorten to compensate from the rise in the heel, and even the internal organs must re-adjust as the body is now standing at an angle.
Any scientific research in this area confirms that shoes are behind ill health effects. In Haiti for example, of the non-shoe wearing population, 3% have foot, leg and back problems, whereas 75% of the shoe wearing population report problems in those areas. When we arrive at cushioned running shoes, problems are compounded. Not only do we no longer feel the landing, but we are lulled into a false sense of comfort with each step arising from the cushioning - hence the increased likelihood for injury. When our feet contact the ground directly, we automatically adjust our landing. If we land too hard, we will feel pain. Thus, the pain would guide us as to how to land. This issue becomes even clearer if we observe gymnasts. They land on cushioned mats, and they are prone to an enormous incidence of injury. On the other hand, ballet dancers, who land on hard wooden floors with minimal ballet shoes, develop great power in their feet, ankles and legs, and are much less prone to injury.
Barefoot running in effect teaches us to land lightly, and this is a form of efficiency found in Africans, but virtually non-existent in Americans from what I have seen. Americans crash their feet into the ground because their feet cannot see. They are blindfolded by the cushioning. Americans are oblivious to what is going on. I first noticed this at the NCAA Regional Cross-Country Final in Boston at Franklin Park two years ago. Iona's Kiplagat, an African, won the 10K in under 30 minutes. Like Luka and Lomong, he landed his feet like a feather. Likewise, he sprung up after each landing due to powerful muscular strength coming from his feet. When I watched the Americans, the difference was clear. Can you imagine how much energy is wasted when one crashes his foot into the ground?
When studies were done to try to understand why Africans have emerged as leaders in long distance running, it was found that between Africans and Westerners, there are no inherent genetic differences. That means Africans have made their gains through differences related to their culture. They are poorer, walk around shoeless, and lack the kind of technology that allows us to sit around or drive etc. - hence they are better at running - a simple formula. Pounding or shock to the legs, which leads to injury, does not come from running as we all have been told. By landing lightly on the ball of the foot, and flexing the leg, the shock is naturally distributed and dissipated by the body's own shock absorbers.
If pounding should come from running in and of itself, Native American Indians would have spent countless hours with the Medicine Man rather than out there running their 300+ miles a week, and podiatry would be the fastest growing occupation in Africa. Pounding comes from the shoes, which inhibit our natural ability to discern how to land our feet. I am certain the running community does not have a monopoly on this problem. I believe that basketball shoes, tennis shoes, etc. etc. are equally as guilty.
Four years ago, Red Hook XC coach Greg Rafferty handed me an article by the late Arthur Lydiard - the so-called "father of modern training" and coach of a great number of world-class athletes and Olympic champions. Coach Rafferty was concerned that I was pushing my son David too much in training, and he was correct. In the article, Lydiard severely criticized the way we Americans train our runners. One of his criticisms was over running shoes. He said that they virtually destroy our ability to use our feet properly. He went on to say that if our shoes allowed our foot muscles to develop, it would amount to a difference of one minute in a 10K. Last June, my sons Joe and David ran the Orange County 10K. My son David was fortunate enough to win an age group medal in that race. Bill Rogers, who himself ran in the race, in fact awarded the medals. For that, David got into a 20-minute conversation with Bill who is very personable. Bill told David that he reached his peak in running when he did 135 miles per week.
This actually corresponded with Lydiard's training. Arthur Lydiard said that by experience, he found that his runners performed best when they did 100 miles per week with an additional 40 to 50 miles of jogging. It was said of Bill Rogers that if one were to run beside him, they would not be able to hear the sound of his feet hitting the ground. Frank Shorter, who had a foot injury, adjusted his style of running in order not to worsen the injury. In so doing, he began to land extremely lightly on his feet. Shorter, Rogers, and Lydiard's champions could all manage the long weekly mileage. They ran in the days when shoes were just a piece of rubber under the feet. They all developed strength in their feet. Lydiard in fact always worked to strengthen the feet of his runners, and he always taught that foot strength was intimately linked to speed.
Today we think of long mileage as the prime causal factor in running injuries. It is not the mileage. It is the way we run. If we run improperly for 20 miles a week, and then do 120, of course we will get hurt. The trick is to run correctly, and then the sky is the limit. Barefoot running teaches us correct running form, and correct running efficiency. There is no substitute. The greats in the past and the Africans of today were and are, plain and simply, just more efficient. And the shoes of the past were muscle friendly compared to the shoes of today.
The McDougals wore flats or lightweight shoes in their training, and ran on trails. This gave them an advantage and helped them no doubt escape injuries that their running contemporaries could not avoid. I believe they would have done better barefoot as do the Africans, but flats do allow foot muscles to function much better than heavily cushioned training shoes. By avoiding injury, the McDougals could keep improving. Injuries put wedges in running development and often end careers.
You may ask how is it possible to run barefoot here in the USA. We might step on things, the weather can be too cold or too hot etc, etc. Well, simply speaking, it becomes a matter of will. If we want to, we can. We have to use some wisdom, some discretion, but we can do it. In Red Hook, over the past summer, we started in the fields around the High School. We began like babies running 5 to 10 minutes a day barefoot, and then increasing day by day as the summer went on. We were engaging muscles in the feet that had been sleeping for years, and we had to be patient. We worked with about 15 runners from Red Hook and Rhinebeck. At first, it all seemed so strange. Within a few weeks, virtually no one wanted to go back to wearing shoes. Soon, we were all spreading our toes, a sign that we were regaining lost muscle strength in the forefoot. We all became accustomed to the cool, wet morning grass, and our feet felt so light.
My sons Joe and Dave, who had practiced barefoot over the winter indoors, got up to 126 and 135 miles per week respectively - a feat that would have been impossible in shoes. They both encountered some difficulty, but they made it to the fall cross country season healthier than ever. By August, we acquired an incredible ally - Nike. They came out with Nike Free - the barefoot running shoe. In their ad for the shoe, they all but admitted that barefoot running was best, and then their clever marketers managed to squeeze in the fact that we cannot run barefoot in America; so we have to buy their $85 shoe. Yes - that's what they're banking on - our fear, our inability to transcend our culture, but their own research confirms the fact that they have been misleading people for years with their cushioned running shoes, which, now by their own admission, should be our last choice--after no shoes at all and then the Nike Free. (I call it the Nike Slave because any shoe enslaves the foot). Yes, there are concerns with training barefoot, but unless we face this issue head on, we will continue to trail the Africans and/or keep moving over to the sideline in casts.