Should You Get This New Advanced Topics in Cross Country Training Program?

If you’re the type of cross country coach who, when the right program comes along, isn’t afraid to spend actual human money in order to get better at coaching, keep reading. 

That being the case, I’ll skip all the standard fare marketing strategies and get right down to brass tacks:

Is Scott Christensen’s new Advanced Topics in Cross Country Training program the right coaching resource for you?

I’m finding there are two primary questions you may have, either of which could be preventing you from investing in the course.

Here they are (and if I swung and missed, you can post your question/s at the bottom of the page):

Question #1: “I have some of Scott’s other Complete Track and Field Programs. How much of the material in Advanced Topics in Cross Country Training is new? Would you consider the training and physiology a summary or repetition of the previous videos or a progression of Scott’s experiences/knowledge?”

SCOTT CHRISTENSEN says: “This latest cross country project is by far the highest level of instruction that I have written for Complete Track and Field.

If I was to fit the presentation into Bloom’s Level of Learning Taxonomy it would at the “analysis and synthesis” level of understanding for the student.

 

The original cross country program that I wrote and the complete workout package are presented at the "knowledge-application-comprehension" levels. Using either presentation is extremely helpful to coaches in various situations with diverse academic backgrounds and different team performance expectations.

By creating this new program, we get coaches closer to the top "evaluation level" where they are completely on their own to make their own decisions and judgements on training and team issues. Some coaches can get to that level on their own, many cannot. Some can do it with just the workout plan package, others need further help.

Hence the advanced program. It fills out all of Bloom's Level of Taxonomy.

I tried hard to make little repetition from the previous programs, but it is impossible. There is considerable scientific theory in both presentations. I tried to reach to the highest level on the latest program, while also realizing many people viewing it may not own the workout package.

This is the long answer.

The short answer is people that own other Complete Track and Field packages from me, or have been a student of mine at USATF or USTFCCCA schools over the last few years, or have read some of the 94 articles I have written for the site, or have just emailed me with questions may recognize some of this material."

 

Question #2: How exactly is this different from Scott's 'Training Model for HS Cross Country'?

SCOTT CHRISTENSEN says: "The Advanced Topics Symposium in Cross Country was developed to cover coaching and program preparation in the sport of cross country running for all levels of coaches and athletes.

Broad themes of the symposium include athlete management, training design, performance psychology issues, philosophy, administration and ethics in building a team culture, competition management, technical issues and instruction, and sports sciences related to cross country running.

The Advanced Topics Symposium serves as a more detailed follow-up to the Training Model for High School Cross Country presentation because it goes into greater detail as to the “why” things are done as they are in a training program and what is effective team building.

The Training Model course was developed to give cross country coaches “what” and “when” workout ideas for every day of the season as the training cycles progress.

The Advanced Topics Symposium gives coaches the knowledge, skills, and confidence to develop their own workout ideas along a similar sequence to The Training Model presentation, but not following it from day to day.

Hopefully, a cross country coach will have the skill to individualize a training program for their unique team and talent after watching the Advanced Topics Symposium.

The first four modules present current scientific knowledge of endurance runner anatomy and physiology, including reasons and pitfalls related to adaptation to training stimuli and causes of fatigue. The remainder of the modules relates presented scientific information to training schemes."

So there you have it.

You can get immediate access to Scott Christensen's Advanced Topics in Cross Country Training program for half price when you purchase by Sunday July 3.

 

 

Again:

If you have questions about the program that were not answered in this post, you can submit them below.

Updated on September 25, 2023