Leading Girls in the Tempo Run
On Wednesday I visited the St. Patricks Camp. Brother Colm puts on a four week camp around Easter for about 40 of the promising high school runners in Kenya. An invitation to this camp is a real privilege. Brother Colm has been putting on this camp for many years. Most of Kenya’s international elite runners have attended. Historically, about 1 in 5 participants goes on to be an international star.
For those that haven’t heard of Brother Colm, I should say a few words about him. He is one of the most respected coaches in the world. He coaches at St. Patricks High School which is a national school, meaning that youth from all over Kenya might apply to attend. While there have been 4 high schoolers to run a sub-4 minute mile in the entire history of the United States, St. Patricks had 4 high schoolers running sub-4 minutes attending at one time! Brother Colm has coached many high schoolers who have gone on to win at the Olympics, World Championships, Boston Marathon, etc. He is now coaching 3 alumni who live in a house next to him: David Rudisha, Augustine Choge, and Isaac Songok. Watch for these guys at this year’s world championships. To summarize, Brother Colm is sort of a combination of Joe Newton and Joe Vigil on steroids.
The camp begins at 6AM with a ten minute jog followed by exercises, which can include core and/or drills. The day’s main session is at 10AM. This is what I attended. It was a busy day, as a film crew was making a documentary about Brother Colm and Kenyan running.
There are four assistant coaches working with Brother Colm. His main assistant is Ian, a 25 year old Kenyan whom Brother Colm identified at St Patricks as a promising apprentice. Brother Colm was busy being interviewed, so Ian ran much of the practice. Here is what I observed:
9:50 I arrived. The team is lounging in the grass stretching and talking.
10:00 Ian gathers the team to describe the workout. Today is to be a “high run,” which means hard. The plan is 25-30 minutes of tempo running on a very hilly course on dirt roads. Ian cautions the athletes to take it easy on the initial downhills so as not to risk injury. He assigns groups of between 4-10 athletes, and describes the route each will take. The fastest boys and girls will run 8k, the slower groups about 6k.
10:05 All the groups begin their warmup. This occurs on a grassy field about half the size of a soccer field. The groups run together in single file slowly and they stick together. There are about 7 different groups running in different directions around the edge of the field. There is no talking; these athletes are focused.
Groups warming up in the field
10:15 Ian calls the first group over to the dirt road to begin the tempo run. It is the slowest girl group. Every minute or two he calls a group over and they begin. The other groups continue easy jogging or drills in the field.
10:25 The final group, the fastest boys, have begun. Ian, the other coaches and I pile in Brother Colm’s car to check on the runners. Brother Colm will stay to work on the documentary. We catch up to one group about 10 minutes out, and there are 5 girls together with one girl starting to fall behind. She is clearly trying hard to maintain contact with the group.
We drive ahead and catch up to the fastest girls and boys groups. They are right at the point where the boys are passing the girls. They are about 6k into the run and are on a 2k uphill. These groups have really broken up; they are running really fast! We stop and watch them. The coaches comment on their form. “This run separates the men and the boys,” comments one coach. They point out athletes for me: Janeth was 5th at world cross country, Stacy ran the Commonwealth 1500m. These athletes are already stars! On this day Michelle Sykes, who represented the US at the 2007 World Championships runs with the girls- the slow group.
Boys Doing Drills after their Cooldown Jog
10:55 The last athletes finish the run. Immediately after finishing the tempo run the athletes do 10 minutes of jogging. They are in smaller groups now, between 3-5 athletes. They follow this with 10 minutes of drills and core exercises. They don’t waste any time. They are not rushed, but there is no standing around.
11:15 All athletes are finished.
The athletes will do an easy run at 4PM, their third workout of the day. The 6AM jog/exercises and the 4PM jog occur daily. The 10AM session is different every day. They followed the following schedule the rest of the week:
Wednesday: Tempo Run
Thursday: Easier run
Friday: Intervals on track
Saturday: “Diagonals” 30 minutes of strides/jogging
I’ll write more about St. Patricks later, as I plan to visit again. I’ll finish with a funny story from the day.
The host of the Irish documentary is Eamonn Coughlan, a world champion middle distance runner from the ‘80s. After the workout he was introduced to Michelle simply as “Eamonn.” We all talked, as Eamonn attended college and lived in the U.S. He talked about racing in the U.S., and then Michelle said: “Wait a minute. What’s your last name?” Eamonn answered, and she exclaimed: “I thought so; you’re famous!”
Later Michelle said, “We’re in Iten. What should I expect? Everyone’s a super runner. It’s not just some guy named Eamonn. It’s Eamonn Coughlan.”
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