LetsRun.com Footlocker XC Contest
*Jump to login page (Please note that we have provided you a guide of who to vote for but it's hard to find - scroll down on the vote page and you'll see it)

This week is the big daddy of them all in the high school ranks, the Footlocker Cross Country National Championships. For 29 years, Footlockers have pitted the best runners in the country (and no one else) against one another to determine a true national champion. Footlocker's are beautiful in their simplicity and this year there is added attention on Footlocker's because of the incredibly strong men's field.

And while Nike does a wonderful job with its Nike Team Nationals, many believe (here and here) they want to get rid of Footlocker's (although Footlocker's demise was first talked about in 2004) Even is this is true, Footlocker is Nike's biggest customer in the world, so Nike may not just get its way.  In Nike's annual report, there is 1 customer listed and it is Footlocker:.

Significant Customer Foot Locker, Inc., which operates a chain of retail stores specializing in athletic footwear and apparel, accounted for approximately 10 percent of global net sales of NIKE, Inc. during fiscal 2007. No other customer accounted for 10 percent or more of our net sales during fiscal 2007. ).

Hopefully, Footlocker's will be around for a long time. Regardless, the biggest high school race of the year deserves a world famous LetsRun.com prediction contest.

We will be awarding 2 prizes overall.
*1st prize is a $100 gift certificate to the online leader in track and field shoes Eastbay (which is owned by Footlocker).

*2nd place is a $50 gift certificate from Eastbay.

(Eastbay is offering a very generous 20% of Gift Cards This Holiday Season).

20% off Gift Cards!!!

$200,700 Perfect Ballot: It ain't going to happen, but if you pick the first 10 in the boys' race and first 10 in the girls' race perfectly correctly, we'll give you $10,000 a year for 27 years.

Actually before we get into the contest, let us first state the contest is void in all states, places, and what not where it is illegal and if you are too young to play, don't play. Read up on your local laws as we don't have a lawyer to pay for the legal language. We'll do our best to run the contest, but are not liable for malfunctions, errors, server failure, database failure, or omissions. Now onto the contest. The contest is not in any way shape or form endorsed or associated with Footlocker, Inc. One entry per person.

The Individual Prediction Contest Scoring
The contest is pretty simple and is designed to reward you for picking the top 5 individuals correctly in the exact order. You give us your top 10 in the boys and girls races. For each of your picks in that finishes in the top 5, regardless of where you have them picked, you will receive 50 points. For each of your picks, regardless of were you have them picked, that finishes in the top 10, you will receive 25 points.  Thus if all of your top 10 picks finish in the top 10 but the wrong order you would receive 5 x 50 + 5 x 25 which is 375 points before we subtract points for not picking them in the correct position exactly..

Now, we will penalize you for not being accurate in your picks. You will only lose three points for each spot that one of your picks is off.

But the key to the contest is the bonus points you get for picking the top 5 dead on.   The bonus is as follows:

1st place correct: 200 point bonus (250 total points as you'll get 50 for being in top 5 as well)
1-2 in order correctly: 300 point bonus (400 total points as you'll get 50 for each in the top 5 as well, thus it's a 100 extra for nailing 2nd right)
1-3 in order correctly: 375 point bonus (525 total points as you'll get 50 for each in the top 5 as well, thus it's 75 extra for nailing 3rd)
1-4 in order correctly: 425 point bonus (625 total points as you'll get 50 for each in the top 5 as well, thus it's 50 extra for nailing 4th)
1-5 in order correctly: 450 point bonus (700 total points as you'll get 50 for each in the top 5 as well, thus it's 25 extra for nailing 5th)

Individual Tie Breaker (tie breakers will only be used to determine the winner of the contest): The first tie-breaker is who picked the order of finish correctly the farthest on either the boys' or girls' side. So if you picked 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th correctly while the person you tied for 1st with only picked 1st and 2nd correctly you would win. If you both picked say 1-4 correctly on either the men's or women's side, then we'll see who did better with the other sex.

The second tie-breaker is how many runners that you had being anywhere in your top 10 actually finished in the top 10 in both races. So if you have 6 runners who actually finished in the top 10 on your list and the person you tied with only had 5 you will win.

And the third tiebreaker is a draw from a hat.

Get Started: Login and Vote
The polls are pretty simple. All you need is a letsrun.com login (if you have participated in a contest in the past you already have one or if you have registered a name on our message boards you have one as well) to vote. If not just click here and you can sign up for a login name.

On the next two pages you will vote for your men's and women's top 10 finishers at the Footlocker Champs. You can vote for just the men's top 10 or just the women's top 10 if you don't want to do both sexes. You can come back and login again and change your votes.

Click here if you do not have a login
(Please note that we have provided you a guide of who to vote for but it's hard to find - scroll down on the vote page and you'll see it)