To be clear, I'm used to kids who want to sprint who aren't any good at it. That's pretty much the state of 80% of freshmen and sophomores who run track. The problem here is that our sprint crew is mediocre enough that he actually is capable of helping them and, further, that he's been way more candid about identifying distance running as "for white kids" than most of my runners.

This is a rising junior, who finished last cross country season (his first, played football his freshman year but his parents squashed that) as our #3 runner. He plays basketball in the winter, though my understanding is that he's a coin toss to make varsity this year. He ran outdoor track last spring, and in spite of his success during cross country, I ended up spending all season trying to have an open mind to his desire to be a sprinter.

He's not a sprinter. Watching him, you'd be able to tell this instantly. He's not explosive at all, but keeps a nice, efficient stride going pretty much interminably. He also has an instinctual sense of pacing that's extremely hard to teach, and has a blood-in-the-water sense for when people in front of him start to tire. Empirically, he topped out in the 24.high/54.mid range for 200/400 but ran 2:06.xx for us in the 800m without doing *any* distance work since the fall. I actually don't think he's even an 800m runner at the end of the day, but that was the compromise we agreed on this season.

As I've said, he's been pretty clear that he's not interested in the events for white kids. Part of me thinks this will just pass. Cross country races in our area are 90% white and that hasn't stopped him from being competitive and engaged. But I think he's got a chance to be a special miler/2-miler in track, like in the 4:15/9:20 range if he actually commits to the distance events.

I've learned over the last year that one of the worst mistakes a coach can make is wanting it more than the kids. So, I'm not going to push too hard. And I'm also really uncomfortable making arguments based on future promises like "if you run the mile, DI schools will start throwing money at you." Distance running is hard and boring succeeding at that level will take way more than just saying "yes, I'd like to do this."

But I'm a much better judge of talent than I am at actually coaching that talent, so I'm pretty sure I'm right about this. Anybody got any insight on this? I'm not really sure how useful it'd be for his white, middle-aged coach to engage his central argument - even if it's untrue at both the high-school and college level in the United States.