Oregonian Quote-Vin

A lot of college coaches are not very smart.

VinL wrote:

“In muddy races like today, you want to make sure to establish your position in front early, because it is very hard – if not impossible – to move up. We will have to run a lot tougher and turn around. We can do it in 10 days.”

Now don't get me wrong as I am no CU supporter, but that is a school that has found their way onto the podium and into the number one spot several times by avoiding the front of muddy races. They've done this for years-different teams but this statement just seems silly to me when I think about that.

A ridiculous statement. So-called "positioning" is the most over-coached, over-rated aspect of distance running. Ducks got what they deserved by running like idiots.

Alan Arkin wrote:

A ridiculous statement. So-called "positioning" is the most over-coached, over-rated aspect of distance running. Ducks got what they deserved by running like idiots.

So since they didn't follow his advice they are idiots, and if they followed his advice they'd also be idiots...yea clearly you are not biased against them.

It's a regional meet. Maybe they'll do the same at Nats, maybe they'll do worse, maybe better. But people get a little too worked up about a regional meet, and their pathetic feelings toward certain programs.

The O in Oregon stands for Overrated, I think thats what Vin was trying to say

What a TERRIBLE assessment and quote by Vin Lananna. Funny thing is, Oregon provided splits and split scores for the regional, which shows that Oregon DID establish themselves up front early on. They nearly tripled their split 1 score by the end of the race. Besides Stanford, the teams that went out hard paid hard in the end. You can see yourself.

http://www.sml1.com/recordtiming/ncaa/westregion09/?SPSID=4337&SPID=238&DB_OEM_ID=500

Noteably

300 points and 9th place at split 1, Portland scores 84 for 2nd by the end of the race.

You obviusly were not at the West Regional meet at Oregon. The conditions and course were not condusive to coming from behind and passing people. I watched the race and there wasn't that much passing in either the men's or women's race. The early pace wasn't that fast in the men's race so early positioning was key. The women's race was extremely slow. The first mile of the women's race was 5:45. If you weren't in the top 40 of the women's race at the mile mark then you weren't going to have a good day of running. Vin's comments should not be attributed to every race that is muddy. But Vin was right about the muddy race on Saturday in Oregon.

Walrus Creek wrote:

You obviusly were not at the West Regional meet at Oregon. The conditions and course were not condusive to coming from behind and passing people. I watched the race and there wasn't that much passing in either the men's or women's race. The early pace wasn't that fast in the men's race so early positioning was key. The women's race was extremely slow. The first mile of the women's race was 5:45. If you weren't in the top 40 of the women's race at the mile mark then you weren't going to have a good day of running. Vin's comments should not be attributed to every race that is muddy. But Vin was right about the muddy race on Saturday in Oregon.

What race were you watching? it obviously wasn't the same one I was. Look at these split scores:

Stanford - 30 - 28 - 32 - 27

Portland - 300 - 94 - 86 - 84

Oregon - 39 - 76 - 97 - 109

Washington - 185 - 126 - 145 - 120

ASU - 158 - 169 - 165 - 155

Cal Poly - 279 - 186 - 163 - 155

UCLA - 137 - 172 - 183 - 207

UCSB - 300+ - 247 - 223 - 217

Cal - 300+ - 256 - 231 - 217

WSU - 183 - 249 - 244 - 268

Stanford obviously is on another level. Oregon went out hard and died big-time. UCLA went from 3rd at the first split to 7th at the end, ASU went from 4th to T-5th, and WSU went from 5th to 10th. Washington went out moderately and almost beat Oregon. Portland went out slow and crushed them. Cal Poly went out slow and pulled off a very surprising T-5th. Cal and UCSB went out wicked slow and moved up. Dude just look at the splits. The teams that overperformed are the ones that went out conservatively. With the exception of Stanford, every team that went out hard finished in a worse position than they started in.

Definitely one of the most interesting breakdowns I've ever seen. Especially the contrast b/t Stanford and Portland.

I was definitely there. I watched Portland come from behind, taking about 200pts off their score to get 2nd. I watched UCLA and Wash St. fade badly. I watched UW race from 6-7th to 4th, almost beating Oregon. I watched Oregon fade from 39-109 points.

The split scores tell the same story. What did you see?

Terminator X wrote:

[quote]Walrus Creek wrote:

You obviusly were not at the West Regional meet at Oregon. The conditions and course were not condusive to coming from behind and passing people.

I was there too and so I have a right to make rediculous claims with no basis.

Where in the Oregonian did you find the quote? What you posted is the 2nd half of Vin's statement. The first part of the quote is omitted, and I wonder if the omission is motivated by bias.

Here's the whole quote: “We started off in a good place, but then we decided to press the pace, which was not a good thing to do and not our plan,” said Lananna. “I believe we are a trophy team, but we didn’t run like one today.

“In muddy races like today, you want to make sure to establish your position in front early, because it is very hard – if not impossible – to move up. We will have to run a lot tougher and turn around. We can do it in 10 days.”

Everyone on the Ducks, including the team, coaches, and ardent supporters, would agree that Ducks ran very poorly relative to their potential at Regionals. However, don't make it out to be any worse than what it really is.

VinL wrote:

“In muddy races like today, you want to make sure to establish your position in front early, because it is very hard – if not impossible – to move up. We will have to run a lot tougher and turn around. We can do it in 10 days.”

Now don't get me wrong as I am no CU supporter, but that is a school that has found their way onto the podium and into the number one spot several times by avoiding the front of muddy races. They've done this for years-different teams but this statement just seems silly to me when I think about that.

You are mistaken. CU avoids the front of races because they train at altitude. Training at high elevation limits the way you can race at sea level. Try doing long slow intervals and tempos and very little fast training and see what kind of oxygen debt you experience when you go out hard at the beginning of a race.

The first split was at 4:02.74 into the race and the first 100 runners at this split were within 8.3 seconds of each other. Portland's score at 300 compared to Oregon's 39 shows that their guys were a few seconds back of the leaders less than a mile into the race.

The second split was after 17 minutes is a better indicator of who went out too hard.