Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #49: Gill1918 Presents David Mitchell “Honoring the Baton” Powered by Coach O

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#49: Gill1918 Presents David Mitchell “Honoring the Baton” Powered by Coach O · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

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  Welcome to the Gill 1918 Project, a podcast series by
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  coaches for coaches, powered by Gill Athletics.
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  Think of it as the Ted Talks of track and field coaching.
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  Short, insightful, and packed with valuable strategies to help
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  you grow as a coach. This episode is part of the
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  Youth and Beginner Series, brought to you by Coach O.
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  In this series, we focus on topics relating to coaching
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  youth athletes, coaching beginner athletes of any age,
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  and supporting brand new coaches as they find their way.
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  With that in mind, let's grow. Hey everybody, I'm David
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  Mitchell, and I'm here today to talk to you about developing a
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  culture that honors the relay baton and how defining roles and
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  responsibilities for each relay leg supports them.
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  Good ideas are often birthed after struggles or failures.
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  My teams had a few of those, and it led to setting up this system
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  that I hope will help you avoid some of those uncomfortable
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  moments. Let me tell you about two of the
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  most painful failures. 4 by 800 meter relay at state
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  championship. Ran great, over 4 seconds,
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  better than anytime that year. School record, but got passed on
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  the anchor and finished second. So what went wrong?
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  My anchor flicked the baton down at the track and we were
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  dequeued. No points, no medals, no school
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  record. He knew better.
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  So why did he do that? Because we had gotten our home
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  track resurfaced that year with a nice bouncy surface, and he
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  had gotten into the habit of bouncing the baton off the track
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  and catching it, just flicking it down, having it flip a
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  partial flip and grabbing in his hand.
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  He was a great kid and a great runner, so I didn't get on him
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  about it when he did it at the state meet, though on the harder
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  track surface. Think any clang clang, awful
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  sound that no coach ever wants to hear, and disqualification.
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  One improvement to our culture after that was to implement the
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  rule that if a baton ever hit the track or the ground during
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  practice or even during a meet, everybody stopped what they were
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  doing and did 5 push ups. That happened another time on
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  the same day, the number of push ups doubled and that continued.
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  It really helped instill the importance of protecting and
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  honoring the baton and caused a little bit of positive peer
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  pressure. Those athletes did not want
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  their teammates unhappy with them for having to do the push
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  ups. The other painful incident that
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  reinforced the need for roles and responsibilities for each
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  relay leg happened at the regional meet.
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  At that time, the only way to qualify for the state meet.
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  This time it involved the 4 by 200m relay.
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  We are in the fastest seat along with the number one team in the
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  state, but the top two were auto qualifiers so we were only
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  paying moderate attention to them.
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  Out in front our team ran great, clearly in second place, but
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  really not terribly far behind good old number one and well
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  ahead of 3rd and 4th place. Those teams were clearly behind
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  us. It was clear that we were about
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  to qualify for state, score eight points in the regional
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  meet, and smash our school record in the process.
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  That is until our anchor leg came clearly into view and had a
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  bright white puka shell necklace bouncing up and down on his
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  collarbone. Instant DQ not going to state.
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  No points for the regional no school record.
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  The biggest insult came at the state meet when our regional
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  time would have placed second place overall.
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  Brutal. We had the roles and
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  responsibilities in place at that point, but this relay was
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  made-up of three seniors and a junior on the anchor.
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  They had been taking care of business all year long, so I did
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  not stay on them about following through with the roles and
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  responsibilities. Great kids, top athletes, but I
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  shouldn't have let them get slack in the way that they did
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  things. Culture, it's sometimes said as
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  whatever we as leaders do or do not tolerate.
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  And there I tolerated a little too much.
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  Actually, in both of those instances, I tolerated things
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  that I shouldn't have and unfortunately, it came back to
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  haunt us. So what are the roles and
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  responsibilities? First off, we only kept our
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  batons home or away in our big black metal medicine kit Med
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  kit. For dual meets when we put out
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  multiple teams onto the track in each relay we'd bring lots of
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  batons, enough to make sure we had enough to fill fill the
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  lanes at those times. But for a big meet, we would
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  only bring 2, the two in the most pristine, unscratched,
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  undented condition. Sometimes I might bring a third
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  one that was hidden that they didn't know about because I just
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  wanted to be sure. But as far as the athletes knew,
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  we had two batons. They were always in the Med kit.
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  The lead off leg have the responsibility of getting the
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  baton, keeping possession of it and getting it to the starting
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  line on the track. It was the lead off legs
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  responsibility to be steady and reliable, AKA no false starts,
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  and to set the stage by competing well and passing off
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  the baton very cleanly. Second leg had to get the relay
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  card from me, turn it into the clerk at the appropriate time.
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  If there were no relay cards, like at a dual meet, the second
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  leg shared the responsibility of the third leg that I'll describe
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  for you in just a minute. On the track, the role of the
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  second leg was to receive and give the baton smoothly and to
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  establish position. Second and third leg both had to
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  be good receivers and good at handing off.
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  Sometimes that helped dictate who got to be the lead off leg.
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  If they couldn't receive very well or for some reason the
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  anchor leg didn't hand off the baton very well, that got them
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  on the anchor leg more often than not.
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  The athletes were able to do all of those things just fine, and
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  it was able to be placed more on ability than anything else.
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  So second leg had to go out and establish that position for US.
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  Third leg's job off the track was to check uniforms and
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  jewelry to ensure that everyone was legal, properly equipped,
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  dressed legally on the track. The third leg also needed to
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  receive and give the baton smoothly in addition to being
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  what we call the first anchor, getting the baton into or near
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  the lead on that third leg. Third leg was a very important
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  leg and often overlooked some coaches at clinics.
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  I can remember Tony Veeny was a great speaker at clinics,
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  probably still is, and he talked about teams that had three
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  horses and a donkey or three studs and a dud.
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  And where do you, where do you put the donkey or where do you
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  put the dud? And we could talk about that all
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  day long in another situation. But just one of those things
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  that goes into the makeup of a relay team is figuring out how
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  to best deploy your personnel based on their ability.
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  So the anchor or the 4th legs job was to remain calm when
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  receiving the baton and then go compete.
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  Not to overthink, not to strategize, but compete as hard
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  as possible through that finish line.
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  After the race. The anchor leg had the
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  responsible responsibility to personally return the baton to
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  the Med kit in a timely fashion because unless they were in the
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  4x4, somebody else was going to need that baton before the meet
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  was over later on. So that fourth leg, if, if I had
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  been enforcing that at the state meet, might not have gotten
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  flicked down on the ground. We didn't have that part in
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  place yet. That was in just my 4th year as
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  a head coach. Or more accurately, if I had
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  stopped him from flicking the baton and picking it back up off
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  the nice bouncy track. But it looked kind of cool.
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  And I admit I kind of wanted to do it myself, but I never did
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  because I had been had it instilled in me coming up as an
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  athlete to honor the baton. When the honor of the baton
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  culture was fully established and the roles and
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  responsibilities were made clear and enforced, it eliminated
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  nearly every, never every, but nearly every issue that could
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  cause a disqualification. So do you have an honor of the
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  baton culture? What do you have, what kinds of
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  traditions do you have in place or what will you put in place
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  after hearing this particular talk?
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  Do your 4 relay legs have responsibilities off the track
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  or do you kind of trust them to figure it out on their own?
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  Or do you have coaches that are sort of micromanaging and
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  looking over everything that that happens, everything that's
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  done to be able to do that? I highly recommend that you go
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  ahead and establish both and honor the baton culture.
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  Push ups are great little motivator and that you have
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  those responsibilities lined up. It doesn't have to be the same
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  as what I had, but if you have something defined for them and
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  they know their job on that leg, things will go better for your
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  team. So thank you for listening.
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  If you have an episode or two that you'd like to contribute to
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  the Youth or Beginner series powered by Kocho, or if you have
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  any feedback or questions, please contact me.
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  My e-mail address is clientrelationsnospacesnodotsoranythingclientrelations@coacho.com.
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  I would love to hear from you and hear what your struggles
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  are, what your successes are, and how you plan to make life as
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  a relay coach go even better in this coming season.
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  Thanks for listening. Bye bye.
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  Hey gang, Mike Cunningham here. Thanks for joining us for this
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