Beware parenting post:
With the post of the 8 year old training for the Olympic Marathon it made me think of my own situation. I hadn’t really though to much about it until reading the other post.
I have an 11 year old boy who will be running a half-marathon this weekend. We have a local half marathon that my wife and I run every spring and my boy asked me a couple of months ago if he could run it…I said “sure why not.”…thinking that he would lose interest…I know my boy:) He likes to run like all kids do and he has not lost interest…he has been running quite a bit…not slowtwitch miles…but quite a bit…maybe 3 or 4 days a week however much he feels like. Deep down we think that it is too much too soon but I figured that he would be the better judge of it then us…he is definately not a Type A tri-geek but he has surprised us on this endeavor. I figure that if you have a kiddo that is motivated to do something positive why hold him back? what do you guys think?
I must admit that I am pretty curious to see how he does:)
I think you are right, as long as they are having fun why hold them back. Our running club has a youth program with 9-15 yr old boys and girls and they do pretty well at local events and always seem to have fun. Kids improve at an incredibly fast rate. I know one of the older girls ran a half but I don’t know if any of the younger ones have.
As someone who ran a lot when growing, please encourage your kids to stretch. I had all sorts of Achilles’ tendon problems from running while growing fast.
Great point on the stretching…I am paying for bad habits now. It only takes one trip under the knife to cure the bad habits though…I never miss a stretching routine now.
Why not?
I was swimming 5k’s a few times a week when I was 9 years old.
To only sort of highjack the thread, last month I was in LA to watch a friend run the marathon. At the start, we noticed a big group of kids - probably between 9-13 all wearing a shirt indicating they were part of some group. There were some adults with them as well. I assumed they were there to line up, start the race and then peel off after a few miles. Strangely, we saw them all throughout the course - right up to the finish (my friend finished in about 6 hours and it seemed like lots of the kids were right around that time). I always thought that there were age minimums because of potential future damage on growing bodies, but maybe the LA race directors knew something different.
(As a side note, while I’m on it - the LA marathon struck me as something of a joke, especially given the size of the city it’s in. The course was boring, the crowds were sparse, no big names were racing (because of past prize money fiascos), there were a lot of yahoos running who didn’t look like they’d trained at all (my friend’s 5:51 time put here in about the middle of the crowd) and it struck me as a pretty JV effort.)
There’s a young local kid who I’ve seen at an early season (Feb) 5k the last 2 years.
He always goes out w/ the frontrunners, then fades (ok, so his pacing isn’t the best; he held on better this year vs. last), but I guess since he just turned 14 this year I can cut him some slack.
Here are his times for the 5k for the last 2 years:
2006 - age 13 - 19:59
2007 - age 14 - 18:17 (good for 5th overall)
2008 - he’s gonna kick my old wrinkled ass all over that course 
Good luck to him! I hope he makes it all the way, that’d be great.
(and if not, it’s great that he even toed the line to begin with, that’s WAY more than 99.9% of today’s kids are doing)
I’ve been watching this thread with interest. I’m not a parent, but I do coach kids and teenagers.
Definitely encourage and support your son if running interests him - hook him up with a track club, a soccer club, or a tri group. Let him run 800m and 1500m, or run a local 3k event with him - it sounds like he’s got two good role models (mom & dad) in terms of active living, maybe that’s where he gets the drive for this.
I wouldn’t recommend running the half however…I wouldn’t even recommend running 10k.
Go with your first instinct, a half is too much for an 11 year old. On average, kids under 12 lack the cognitive development for ‘adult competition’, so deferring to the judgement of an 11 year old on whether or not he is ready to run a half doesn’t make sense.
As long as yuor son is self motivated and you mererly encourage without pushing you are all set. Sometimes it works. My son is 13 and although he hasn’t run a half he’s good for the low 19’s in a 5k*.
- For those of you about to call BS: http://www.coolrunning.com/results/06/nh/Sep17_16thAn_set1.shtml
Reminds me of a half marathon I did 6 years ago on a freezing cold windy-as-heck day in NJ. It was snowing for part of the race too. As is often the case at the start, I watched as a few youngsters set out way too fast and some were still ahead of me a quarter mile into the race (I’m doing 6:20 pace). They soon came back though except one, a girl whom it transpired was 10 years old. By half a mile I’m already shocked that she’s still ahead. Took me 4 miles to catch her, still at the same pace, and though she faded a bit she still ran a low 1:28 in the hardest half I’ve ever run. She was sub-20 for 5k-XC at 9, and sub-18 on the road at 11 (and 1:02 for 10 miles). While reading more about her on letsrun.com I discovered that a different 11 year old girl ran a 2:49 marathon and a six year old girl ran a 41 minute 10k!
I wouldn’t recommend running the half however…I wouldn’t even recommend running 10k.
Go with your first instinct, a half is too much for an 11 year old. On average, kids under 12 lack the cognitive development for ‘adult competition’, so deferring to the judgement of an 11 year old on whether or not he is ready to run a half doesn’t make sense.
I don’t get this… how is running further ‘adult competition’
Grant
Interesting article and video I read today about promising American distance runner Ryan Hall
For Mickey a nice, challenging training run was the 15-mile loop around Big Bear Lake, the centerpiece of this scenic resort town nestled 6,748 feet above sea level (and just a two-hour drive from Los Angeles) in the San Bernardino National Forest.
“Can I go with you?” Ryan, 14, asked his father.
“That’s a long way around,” Mickey said, aware that his son had never run for the sake of running.
Ryan begged.
“Okay,” Mickey, a special education teacher at Big Bear High School, replied. “But no whining, though. And you can’t quit. We’re going around the lake. There are no shortcuts home if you get tired halfway around.”
At about mile 12 the tears began forming in Ryan’s eyes. Mickey stopped at a convenience store for some Gatorade and to give Ryan a rest. Then they finished. Ryan did not quit.
“Dad,” Ryan said when they returned home, “I had no idea how hard that would be.”
the distance is not relevant to the type of competition - the average kid (12 and under) cannot contextualize adult competition due to incomplete cognitive development. Given that fact (an immature stage of cognitive development), it does not make sense to say that an 11 year old child “would be the better judge of it” than the parents.
No offense intended to the OP on this - it’s a good discussion, and hopefully it will be valuable to the ST parents.
I wouldn’t recommend running the half however…I wouldn’t even recommend running 10k.
Go with your first instinct, a half is too much for an 11 year old. On average, kids under 12 lack the cognitive development for ‘adult competition’, so deferring to the judgement of an 11 year old on whether or not he is ready to run a half doesn’t make sense.
I think what ‘coach’ is trying to say is that an 11 year-old doesn’t quite get how far 13 miles is. And the 11-year old doesn’t quite realize that he’s going to have to run for about two hours.
Last year when D’Wife did the American Cancer Society Ride (100K) there were many kids finishing on their little Sting-Rays. It’s relatively easy to ride your BMX bike around for 4-6 hours - on a good day, in the right neighborhood and with a bikey Dad like myself, that’s what you do; without even pushing you *could *rack up 30 miles, but you’d never know because who put a computer on a kids bike?
Running for two hours is quite different.
I think once these two points are made; the child should make an informed decision*.
Shit, I run the Philly Distance Run every year* and I have my own doubts every time, and I’m 4x this kids age!!!
**well, there’s been a gap, but …I have recollections
ehh doesn’t prove any points.
He was 14 and from the sounds of it still in 8th grade when he did that run and never ran before. I doubt you can find one person who has never ran before and can even complete 12 miles.
the OP’s son has at least been running. Even if he doesn’t finish, doesn’t do well, or whatever let the kid do it. He’s not going to listen to you if you tell him you he wont finish or he shouldn’t do it. He needs to learn it on his own.
If he runs the whole thing the obviously he was able to run enough before and it wont hurt his body that much. If he can’t finish running it then he wont hurt his body cause he couldn’t run it the whole time.
Some of you guys are acting like hes gonna blow out his body for the rest of his life. Kids his age probably do more damage being kids then running.
Grant
Screw you Cyclone!
Sincerely,
Haden Fry
“Some of you guys are acting like hes gonna blow out his body for the rest of his life. Kids his age probably do more damage being kids then running.”
Grant - you got that right. As a first hand observer - skateboards, snowboards, and BMX bikes have accounted for the lions share of my kids’ injuries. If my kid had his/her head set on running the local half I’d give them the green light.
Can anyone tell me with certainty how a half mary is more of a problem for my kids than the hours of X-Box the typical US kid is engaging in? I just don’t see it. Remember, your body is an amusement park, not a temple. Live it. Love it.
Not good for him. Coachct is right. He shouldn’t do it. If he likes running, try capitalizing on that, but with proper training and race distances for his age.
As for the one who said he was swimming 5k a day as an 11 year old, so running a half is no problem, I don’t know what to tell him other than he is stupid and should think before writing such comments. Why do you think young tri-kids train preferrably a lot more the swimming (with lots of yardage possible at a young age) rather than the running or biking (where focus is “only” on technique, coordination, speed of movement and not on yardage) ?
I grew up surrounded by runners, I spent my childhood weekends at road races, and I’ve been a runner my entire life. My husband is as well–but we both agree if we have kids, while we will certainly encourage them to take up the sport if they want, there will be NO long distance stuff until they are at least 16-18 for a half; 20 or so for a full (like we would have any say by that point :p). So no, I wouldn’t let my kid do it. 5ks, maybe. But 10k and over is just too far for a developing body. I’ve seen first hand too many kids who set themselves up for burnout, injury, and the like by doing too much, too soon.
And for those who say, “Yeah, but there’s this kid…” well, yeah, there may be THAT kid (and who knows how HE will end up, anyway)–but for every “that kid” there are tens, maybe even hundreds, of kids who woudl try it and end up with shin splints, joint damage, stress fractures, etc etc etc. There’s an exception to every rule.
For those who say “I was playing 18 holes of golf a day at age 7” or “I was swimming a 5k”…there’s a HUGE difference between those sports and runnig. Running is SO hard on your body, it just is–there’s really no way around it.
And, finally, for those who say “Well, sure, it may not be the greatest…but think how bad Xbox is or watching TV all day”…well, that’s one of the poorer arguments I’ve heard. Yeah, sure kids sitting front of the idiot tube all day IS bad for them…but that doesn’t mean doing something ELSE that’s bad for them is okay. Being active=good. Being involved in something their bodies aren’t physically ready to do=not good.
Coachct, I 100% agree with you…I should have stressed that I know how I put myself in a corner when telling him yes on the race. I guess I told him yes because I sub-conciously wanted to see how he would respond to the challenge…probably not the right thing to do but I am being honest here. I figured that he would stick with it for a couple of days and then lose interest like most things for kids…well to our surprise he didn’t. The only thing my wife and I have done on this thing is tell him that if he wanted to run it that he would have to eat healthy and run 3-4 days a week. We have not ever asked him how his “training” is going…we let him come to us on it. He is really proud of himself right now and has been telling everyone about his race…there is no way I can pull the plug on him now. We will just let him run the race and be wiser the next time. My wife will be running with him and she will make fun of it…even though he is faster then her!