Detroit, MI

Coach Cummins has been the head coach for men's and women's cross country at Wayne State for 9 years now. In his time there, has has taken the men's and women's programs from the bottom of the conference to near the top of the conference. His men's teams have made it to nationals 4 times and his women have made it twice. Coach Cummins is here to talk briefly about his program and school.

RunMichigan: What type of runners do you get at WSU? Is there are certain type of student/athlete you look for?

CC:  We get student athletes that truly love distance running and competing.  Most of our kids are great students that have high career goals.  You have to be very serious about your academics to survive in our program.  We look for quality people that want to be a part of our program.  We want competitors that have a little bit of talent.

RunMichigan: What do you as a coach and Wayne State as a school have to offer potential runners?

CC:  Obviously we have scholarship money to offer.  We would like to think that we are running a national level program.  The goal of all of our kids is to be as good as they can be.  We don't differentiate between Division I, II, and III or NAIA and Junior College.  We differentiate between quality and not.  We think it is rather simple "You either do it right or you don't do it."  As a coach, I may not be the smartest guy or have the greatest knowledge of physiology but I will work very hard to help each and every athlete in our program to reach their potential as a student- athlete.  As I stated earlier our Univeristy will offer young people a world class education and experience.  They will not give you a degree, each person earns it, but that is what makes it valuable.

RunMichigan: What are your theories on training and racing?

CC:  My theories on training and racing?  We could talk about this for hours.  Our theories are grounded in science.  I have a base system that I believe works well for college distance runners.  I like to work from this system but tweak it for each and every kid.  It is rare that 2 kids in our program run the same number of miles as each other every single week.  The stresses of each athlete are different and vary from day to day, week to week, and year to year,  this must be accounted for.  Most people would look at our program and think that it is strength base.  We do think strength is vital but we don't ignore speed.   We pay attention to the mental aspect of being a competitive runner or should I say competitive collegiate runner.  There are big differences in training/racing/and mental expectations with high school runners / collegiate runners / marathon runners / and recreational runners.  A real good runner will understand these differences and adjust accordingly.  Too many people think that running is running.  We are not trying to train our runners to be able to run fast.  We are training our runners to run fast when the gun fires.

RunMichigan: Lookinig back, how do you feel about this past cross season for your men's and women's team? 

CC: Our men's season was great.  We finished 7th in the country.  I am disappointed that Justin Kessler didn't end his career the way he deserved.  The guy worked his tail off for 4 years and did virtually everything right.  He prepared right for the heat.  He was not dehydrated.  His body just shut down on him in the heat.  Doctors and physiologists will say that you can prepare correctly and take all precautions but sometimes your body shuts down.  Matt Fecht and Chris Mehay earned All-American honors and the guys won a few meets along the way.  The women were rolling well and then we had a few freak injuries that were not related to running.  We lost a kid to an injury from another sport and one to a stress fracture caused by getting hit (not running).

RunMichigan: What is the 06' Cross season looking like for your men's and women's teams?

CC:  We are hoping to make '06 the best season in school history.  The team has big goals and our motto is "keep getting better."  The GLIAC is a great conference with a lot of programs that work hard.  We will continue to work hard and try to compete with the best and we'll have some fun along the way.

Thanks for the great interview coach! (Interview conducted by Nick Cordes)