I am a rising senior boy in high school and I would love to run in college, but I am too slow to get on a team right now. I could probably run D3 but there are no D3 schools I want to go to and the only reason I would want to go to one is to run so I'm not doing that.
Currently, my PRs are not very good (~5:10 mile, 18:30 5k). However, I have only been running for 2 years and halfway through that I had an injury that set my training back by months.
I feel like if I went to a lower to mid level d1 running school and trained by myself until I was a junior maybe I would be fast enough to join the team.
I have never heard of anyone doing this, and would any coaches even want a junior who is slower than some freshman joining their team? Or is it something I could do?