My wife is an elementary school teacher at school that goes from kindergarden to grade 6. It was the regional track and field day in her school board yesterday and a grade six kid from her school that she coaches ran a 5:03 mile. Apparently he finished way, way ahead of the next runner ups.
What’s amazing about this kid is that he’s not really into track. He’s more into all the team sports and running is just a minor sport to him. My wife thinks he’s potential Olympic material if he was to focus on running.
5:03 is a lot faster than I can run a mile and seems darn fast for a kid of that age.
Anybody know what top kids run miles in or what is considered outstanding for their age groups?
The Bantam (10 & under) record is 4-47.62 for 1500m, which is 5-08 pace. The Midget (11-12) 1500m record is 4-22.58 way back in 1980, which is 4-41 pace!!!
Kids in Junior High that are considered “top notch” talent will usually be around 4:30-4:40 by the time they are done with 8th grade. This is in my own experience. I’ve seen guys run 4:45 in Junior High and only turn out to be a 4:20 guy in HS, yet 5:05 guys in Junior High run 4:10 in HS. No doubt, that is a great time for the 6th grader, but that does not equal future success. It looks like the main problem right now is that he isn’t into it. That is a HUGE problem. Maybe he will find a love of the sport with success, but that’s something you have to have. you can’t have that killer instinct in this sport without loving it. And you can’t be great unless you are cold, hard steel on the track. Yeah, he’s young, but it still has to be considered. Great time, let him have fun and you’ll see if he wants to do it.
This kid would fall into the Midget class (age 11). He entered his first Kids of Steel triathlon the weekend before and ran away with his AG. But as mentioned, these are just minor sports to him compared to hockey, basketball, soccer, etc.
I ran a 5:45 in at that age and thought I was the fastest kid ever until I ran 5:42 in the state championships and came in 13th place. I think the winner of the race was flirting with breaking 5 minutes, so I don’t think a 6th grader going 5:03 is too uncommon.
A couple year back my boys were in summer swimming league. A friend brought their son out who hadn’t even been to one practice and shows up for the first meet and whips everyone in every race. Never had a lesson or any organized swimming. Never swam again after that summer. Fast forward, the whiz kid is starting high school in the fall. He is going out for water polo. Never played before but I expect him to be a varsity starter within 30 days. Natural ability is a great thing.
Why is it that many of us almost seem to hit our prime time while in Junior High? I was a 400 meter runner through High School, and my PR for the open 400 was set while in 8th grade. I was the amazing fast kid in Junior High, but was only mediocre in High School. Frustrating.
It’s a good (not great) time, but at that age it neither suggests he will one day be “Olympic material” nor does it necessarily rule him out. There’s a 6th grader in my town who runs 4:50 and a couple old teammates of mine ran 4:48 in the 7th grade (both of whom are great runners, but nowhere near “Olympic material”). Look around and you will find hundreds of anecdotes like these. If he sticks with it, a better predictor of his potential will be his times in high school - but even h.s. times (unless already world class) aren’t great predictors. There are examples of great runners who were not great h.s. runners. Many more examples, however, of kids topping out (or burning out) way before they reach “Olympic material”.
A lot of her friends (boys) can run 5:30’s no problem. A lot of these kids play on elite soccer teams, so they have a lot of endurance training. Plus here in TX, you can pretty much play outside all year round.
If I remember correctly, last year at AAU track my 9-year old daughter ran a 5:45 mile and I thought “wow, she’s fast”… until we got to the Junior Olympics semi-finals where she was soundly beaten by five girls who ran 5:15-5:30 miles… 9 year old girls! They all wore cross-country looking shoes so I assumed they ran all year round, but still… that’s fast.
I thought there were only two sports in texas, football and Spring football…don’t these boys ever want to hook up with hot cheerleaders when they get to highschool?
“Yeah, but it’s and ELITE soccer team.” still puts them behind the kicker in the food chain…
Those kids are all well and fast. Jopefully they will stick with it. The danger of kids running fast so young is that it is due to over training. There have been a ton of examples of kids running fast in grades school but never achiveing the same success in HS and beyond often due to injuries. There is a girl in NJ right now that would have broke the HS national record for the 5K last year in indoors. I think she ran 16:43 on an indoor track. The only problem is that she was a 7th grader and NOT in HS so she can’t have the record. She has been pretty absent all year due to injury. I have personally seen her out running 10+ mile runs in the past. I know she has run 2 to 3 major races in a weekend (5ks and up). She may be able to recover but I have heard second hand that she does not look good and has knee bands on both legs etc. The word on the street is that her father pushes her to run. I know a few people here probably know who she is and may have a different opinion but I think in her case she is training to much at a young age and will likely never reach her full potential.
So while it is great these kids are running fast, hopefully it is just talent at this point. You can develop that talent later but probably won’t fix a broken down runner.
Look around and you will find hundreds of anecdotes like these.
Here’s one. Remember those physical fitness tests they used to make us do? In '78 a six grade kid ran some ungodly distance in the run/walk that no one believed once the results were turned in. They accused him of lying, so he asked to be tested again. They took him to a local college track where a bunch of official looking people stood around watching him. He clocked his first mile at 4:23. They stopped him (wasn’t really breathing all that hard as I remember, and he had to continually dodge the college soccor team that were using the track for running drills), said he proved his point, and he was contatced the next day by the local high school cross country coach who who promptly put him on a training schedule that burned him out by mid-summer.
