Voice of Reason

Flotrack (www.flocasts.com) has a series of terrific video interviews with Olympic medalist, exercise physiologist, and legendary distance running coach Jack Daniels.

From the Flotrack web site:

Daniels has coached 31 individual national champions, 131 All-Americans and has won 8 NCAA team titles. He earned two Olympic medals, Silver and Bronze, in the modern pentathlon. As coach, Daniels was been honored numerous times: he was named National cross country coach of the century, National coach of the year three different times and the World's best coach by Runners' World. In addition to coaching, Daniels has written five books, including Daniels' Running Formula.

In the following video, he discusses at length the question of how much training is best for young runners. Daniels argues that while there is no physiological reason why a runner will physically "burn out" with higher mileage, the real danger is that they will lose interest in the training.

Jack Daniels Interview: Questions I Get Asked

According to Daniels, the most important role of the coach is to make training rewarding, and to create an environment where each athlete can begin to realize their abilities.