Keep Track of Summer Miles

Establishing a strong base of miles run in the summer prior to a fall cross country season is an important precursor to sucess. I have discussed this principle in Coach, Run, Win and in other articles on this website. Summer Workout Plan I believe that a good practice for any high school cross country coach is to keep track of the summer miles athletes run.

There are several reasons for this. First, if you as a coach, are requiring attendance, it is a good record keeping device. Second, you may require runners to run a certain number of miles to be on the team or qualify for special camps. Keeping track of summer miles ensures accuracy and accountability. Third, requiring and documenting miles run has a defensible safety and preparedness aspect. Athletes are more likely to be injury-free, safe and healthy for the first race if they have logged the required base of miles.

How to Keep Track of Summer Miles

I am including a sample of a worksheet I used to document summer miles run. As you can see, it includes daily totals, weekly totals and a comparison with previous years for veterans. Daily totals include any warmup and/or cooldown. Additionally, the “other” column is where I logged miles run away from team practice. Often in the summer, athletes had work, school or vacation conflicts. I believed that as long as they were getting the miles in, I wanted to document them.