Coaching

Leigh began coaching cross-country at Watauga High in 1993. She inherited a very good girls’ team, they having won the state championship in 1990 and 1992, when Leigh’s sister, Holley, was an all-state runner. However, the top two runners on that team became injured early in the season and were not able to finish the season. She knew she had a lot of work to do, though, to make the boys’ team competitive. Their top returning runner had finished in 50th place at the state meet the previous year.

Leigh’s coaching methods were very simple. She loved her runners and they knew it. She never berated or embarrassed a runner. She drilled two thoughts into their heads: 1) Don’t settle. Don’t settle for being a good runner – be the best runner you can be. And 2) You’re stronger than you think. Don’t sell yourself short – you CAN run faster. That 1993 boys’ team that started out in obscurity as far as the state of North Carolina was concerned, finished 3rd in the state that year, and won the state championship the next year. In the ten years that she coached cross-country, her girls’ teams won the state championship one year, finished second three times, and third three times. One year they finished fourth, but were only five points out of first place. Leigh’s boys’ teams won three state championships and finished second three times, and third once. One of those second-place finishes was on a tiebreaker.

Leigh worked at Appalachian State University’s summer cross-country camps. Many of the top coaches in the state would send their runners to ASU’s summer camp so they could get exposure to Leigh as a coach. One of Leigh’s strongest assets as a coach was that she was fast enough to run with the fastest high school runners, girl or boy. She was great at pacing, and one of her favorite, and most successful, tactics was to join a runner on a training run, and while keeping them in conversation, gradually increase the pace to a speed that they would otherwise be uncomfortable with. This was a very physical way to emphasize her coaching points of “don’t settle” and “you’re stronger than you think.” A great example of this occurred with the 1995 girls’ team. At the regional championship meet, one of her runners fell at the start of the race. She then got up and with great determination worked her way up from last place to fourth at the finish. This runner had never done that well before, usually being the third to fifth runner on the team. At the first training run the next week, preparing for the state championship meet, Leigh peeled back and ran with this girl for the last half of the training run. Leigh kept her occupied in conversation while increasing the pace. This runner was shocked when she checked her watch and realized how fast she had been running. The next week at the state championship, she finished a strong third, running much faster than she ever had before, to make all-state.

Leigh was also very much into the psychological aspects of competing. Before every big race, she would give each runner a “focus card,” something to help them concentrate on what they needed to do to be successful in that race. She also was a stickler for the fine details and image. At big races, they warmed up as a team, took their warmups off at the same time, and no matter what the weather, gave the impression that they were perfectly comfortable and eager to run. She also emphasized to each runner to always make their competitor believe that you were running comfortably and that you still had something left in the tank. One of the beauties of cross-country is that often it’s your fifth or sixth best runner who makes the difference for the team. Her 1996 boys’ team had been beaten twice during the season by a powerful team from Leesville Roads high school. At the state championship meet that year, Leigh knew it would be a showdown between those two teams. She also knew that her top four runners would hold their own against Leesville’s top four. She concentrated most of her attention on her number five and six runners, and she stationed herself about a mile from the finish line. At that point, her five and six runners were right behind Leesville’s number five runner. She yelled at her runners as they came by and pointed out the Leesville runner, stressing to them the importance of their race against that one runner. They both stayed with him into the final stretch, and then Leigh’s number six put on a final spurt and edged ahead of the Leesville runner to clinch the state championship for Watauga.

Leigh did not get the greatest athletes. Often she would recruit students who were cut from other sports and make great runners out of them. One such runner had initially tried wrestling as a freshman. Showing little potential as a wrestler, he took Leigh’s advice and switched to cross-country. He started his sophomore year running the 3.1 miles in the upper 19’s and low 20-minute range. Leigh convinced him that he was better than that and that he would cut his time by over three minutes by the end of that season. He ran a 16:29 that year. This runner became one of the greatest runners ever at Watauga, as he went on to run a 15:27 in his senior year at the Footlocker South Regional Championship, qualifying him to run in the Footlocker National Championship and become an All-American.

Leigh gave up coaching cross-country after ten years as her own children were becoming competitive in sports. With all she did in putting a killer away, and being a Hall of Fame athlete at ASU, and her later success as a road racer, and her powerful advocacy for victims, it’s sometimes overlooked that she was one of the greatest distance running coaches in the state and in the country at one time.