Men and women are different and like to be talked to differently. This will hold true in most situations and does in running. When I talked to Mrs. Koschel, she told me that when talking to men she needs to be more direct and tell them what they need to hear, even if it may upset them. Just this past Friday the track team had tryouts and the runners were running a timed 300 meter sprint. There was a man on the team that had strep throat the previous two days and was determined to run the time trials with the rest of the team. All coach had to say, a couple different times, was no. Koschel said that when talking to women she may need to be a bit softer on her approach.
A huge difference in a coach’s language, that will be used every day, is the difference between talking to a group and talking to an individual. Like with any individual, a coach will want to talk to the other person on more of a personal level. There are endless types of personalities, so coaches need to find how to speak to different people. Getting an unmotivated athlete to do something can be difficult if you don’t know how to deal with their personality. Some people may require a small coaxing or motivation while others may need something like a stern talk or even yell. Yelling usually discourages people from wanting to do something, but some will find motivation in it. In high school my coach figured out how I needed to be talked to during workouts and races, and it helped me run, and feel, the best I could. When talking to a group it helps to direct on what you expect from everybody. Koschel mentions how she needs to show that she has the authority and that she is in control of what happens during practice time.
Another group that requires a bit of different communication happens once a year, tryouts. When dealing with new people on the team it is crucial to show how motivated a coach is. The more a coach demands respect at the start of the year, the more they will receive throughout the year. It goes along with motivation, if the first impression of a coach is that they are a pushover and don’t care to much about what is going on, the chances are that the runners will share their enthusiasm.
A coach only coaches during practice and sometimes in more casual settings. When it comes to race time there is nothing a coach can do but sit back and watch. “Run your own race” and “go out and get after it” are said a lot during competitions, mainly because the runner wants to run the way they know how to. Telling a runner to change something right before a race is like adding a new play before a football game and expect it to run flawlessly. During the conference meet last year a girl made it into the finals for the 400 meter hurdles. She barely made it into the finals thus entering with the slowest time. Koschel saw that this might discourage the runner for her final race, but knew there was not much to say but get out there and beat one person! She did just that, she finished all conference and scored for Northwest.
Sometimes a student does something wrong and needs to be reprimanded. I missed a morning practice once and my coach told me I had to do something hard on the football field. When he was telling me what to do he was very unemotional and straight forward, which is exactly what Koschel said.
The opposite goes for motivation. When motivating a coach has to show their passion and dedication to the sport, it the coach isn’t motivated about the sport, why should the athlete. Even my high school coaches showed that they were dedicated to what they were doing. I had a coach miss one of my races in high school but he was still interested on how I felt and how the race went, even though he was the throwing coach. He gave me a lot of motivation throughout high school and made me want to perform.
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