places/chances of running in college:

You could run at Boston college

Are they really that bad? haha

any other ideas people?

Read this, it will help.

high school runner wrote:

Hey Everyone,

I am currently a male

Bruce? Is that you?

If you want to run in college, you have a 100% chance of doing so if you stay healthy. If your goal is to "Run D1" you have a very very small chance of doing that. The dream of D1 running for a good % of runners is this: Year 1. Hold a clipboard and call out splits in XC and Track - "Redshirted" Year 2. Practice with the team, run a home meet or two. Never make a road trip and call out splits/stats etc. Year 3. Quit - either get a P/T job or join a fraternity.

If you truly want to run and have a great experience - run D2/D3 or NAIA

You are very unlikely to run D1.

No one can answer this question except you.

How much did you run this year?

How dedicated are you to doing all the small things that don't make any difference 99.9% of the time but for 1 out of 1000, they prevent an injury?

Are you willing to hold a part time job to hire a coach every summer to keep you from doing too much/too little?

Are you willing to go to/pay for a prep school for a year?

Like someone else said, you can run D3 or NAIA for sure. Most likely you will end up on the practice squad even with these suggestions but I know three guys who went from your stats to running at D1 XC nationals. OK, none of them scored, but they were there. One even ran a national indoor qualifying time but got hurt before the meet came around.

Don't listen to those guys, I sucked more than you in HS and now I'm fast. You'll figure it out if you work at it often, good luck!

my son was similar to you. didn't start running until he was a soph in HS.

progression was (soph/jr/sr)

800: 2:13/2:03/1:58

1600: 4:50/4:35/4:15

3200: N/A/9:45/9:20

XC (5K): 17:50/16:20/15:50

ended up walking on a good D1 program. got no help from admissions.

it's hard to be recruited if you start so late because it all comes down to jr yr track times. so, assuming you start as a soph in XC, you only have about 20 months to put up some elite times.

but, you can walk on most D1 programs if you can run sub-4:20/9:20 as a sr.

you're ahead of where my son was, so it can definitely be done.

good luck!

As a collegiate runner myself my biggest advice would be to fill out questionnaires at all kinds of schools, email coaches, and take a look at all different kinds of schools. Some coaches will take the bait others will ignore you, but that is okay. Don\'t limit yourself to a certain school or division, there are opportunities everywhere.

Any others?

kvjaepokfva wrote:

If you want to run in college, you have a 100% chance of doing so if you stay healthy. If your goal is to "Run D1" you have a very very small chance of doing that. The dream of D1 running for a good % of runners is this: Year 1. Hold a clipboard and call out splits in XC and Track - "Redshirted" Year 2. Practice with the team, run a home meet or two. Never make a road trip and call out splits/stats etc. Year 3. Quit - either get a P/T job or join a fraternity.

If you truly want to run and have a great experience - run D2/D3 or NAIA

Not true. I run at a major D1 and everyone has a fair shot. Not everyone gets to go to the top collegiate meets, but the freshman and slower guys still get racing opportunities at local meets. You have to work your way up, but it's not impossible.

You are off to a good start for your first year, but your times aren't good enough for D1. I went to high school in California as well. I'd estimate that the guys who got into competitive D1 colleges ran around:

At least low 15:00s at Mount SAC, Woodbridge, etc.

Around or below 1:54 in the 800

Around or below 4:16 in the 1600

Around or below 9:20 in the 3200

I didn't break 2:00 or 4:30 until my junior year, so large improvements are possible. What is your training like?