If a D1 team doesn’t add 2-4 Kenyans this summer, are they even trying?

My college coach would say he didn't actively recruit foreign athletes, but would take them on the team if they wanted to come and initiated everything. I like that mentality, these are American universities, especially if you're at a state school. Skipping over good American runners who are part of families paying taxes that go to state universities in favor of someone who has never contributed to life here, seems a bit wrong. Of course I'm talking for scholarship spots.

We still claim him as he runs for Canada. But we'll take Grant Fisher back too while we're at it.

Not sure what the exact percentage is but if you are running 9:10 in HS off like 60mpw, you should be running sub 14 in 3 years after running 90mpw.

problem is that these days if you roll out a team of 7 13:45-14:00 min guys, you aren’t going to be super competitive.

They also have the best minor league pipeline of an NCAA team with SLCC right there

So who has the most kenyans? Will a team of 5 kenyans podium this fall?

OSU, Washington State, NM (so you're counting Samuel as kenyan)?

I’m not sure they’ve taken anyone from SLCC. Dudes that go to BYU typically aren’t starting out at SLCC.

These days, if you're not running 9:10, unless you're a sub-1:53 guy, you can't even walk on to a top 50 DI school. 9:20 and above = DII, DIII, or non-factor DI.

No roster limits in D3. And a rich D3 school could give full financial aid without it being a "scholarship" to any runners whose household income is <$150k. Williams could probably pull this off if they could get admissions to look the other way on academic qualifications every now and then.

I would disagree with this.

This practice ended up being horribly abusive at my Alma mater. Our coach brought in 2-3 new Kenyans each year and only one ever actually made it with the program past the first full season (XC+Track). It was exactly how you described it—ordering them off the menu and they figured it was a plug-and-play formula for success.
They ran some decent times in Kenya and our coach was convinced that “providing them the opportunity to run in the US would unlock their nearly limitless capability”. Most of them came from incredibly poor villages with little to no resources, food, or educational background but had run 4:05 miles or sub-14 5ks. It ended up being complete culture shock, nutritional shock, educational shock, etc. for each one of them. We tried our best as teammates and friends to include them outside of practice but it was clear the adjustment was an immense challenge and most of them felt way out of their element. Most lost any desire to be doing it after a few months of getting harassed by the coaches for not becoming their prized superstar.

They were totally set up for failure. Our coach went off on a tirade a few times on some of them and it completely shut them down. The workouts they got assigned were insane and it was clear the coaches figured they were just thoroughbreds who could pump out unbelievable times on their own accord without appropriately tuned mileage, workout & training structure. Besides the 1 who made it through, all the others got their scholarships cut and kicked out of the program. It was really sad to see. They had no means to obtain the funds for education and had to unenroll from the school. A couple of them were luckily able to get a scholarship to a junior college a few hours away.
Our coach and athletic department refused to even pay for them to get home because they claimed they weren’t responsible for someone who dropped out of the program and unenrolled from the school. They were completely stranded in a foreign country with zero money and got kicked to the curb by our coach and the athletic department. This is still the most morally bankrupt behavior I have witnessed in my entire life. We pooled some money as teammates to help buy 2 of them flights back to their families in Eldoret my sophomore year. I recall being so frustrated at my coach because I was broke as a bum yet still had enough of a moral compass to pitch in what was supposed to be beer money that I had saved up during a summer internship. Seeing a D1 power 5 conference school unwilling to cough up the funds for a one-way return flight for a person who they deemed 100% disposable is still indescribable to me.

99.99% of kenyan athletes come from extreme poverty. Someone like Ruth chepngetich and many others for example, came from absolute poverty, has had a good Nike deal and then made the 2021 kenyan olympic team but registered a DNF. Nike is the official kenyan sponsor so they want their athletes in the team even if she has shown she cant deliver so she was selected for 2022 world championship while other better athletes at the time were left off the team and again another DNF at major champs. Now She is officially informed she is being dropped because you have to be marketable/bring value by making teams, medals and running fast times which she wasn't doing and hadn't done since 2019.

So this is a woman approaching 30s from absolute poverty, you have given her some hope for a few years of escaping it and that dream is all about to go away (and she obviously doesnt want to go back to poverty). So shortly after a DNF at 2022 world champs and being aware she will lose her contract she goes to Chicago marathon and pops up a 2.14.18 pb. A huge drop from her previous pb of 2.17.08. 2023 another DNF and also london marathon 2024 in April faded to 9th(Now she is really desperate she is losing her contract) so comes later in October to run 2.09.

I have just used Ruth C as an example to illustrate but this is what goes on with most athletes in Kenya. It all comes down to keeping their contracts. So Athletics Kenya realized most athletes who dope they do so when they realize their athletics career is coming to an end or is not taking off and they have nothing to fall back to for survival. AK officials started going to villages and holding antidoping meetings in major towns where they advise athletes those who are already earning a living to invest and the rest are advised to make education a priority so that if they don't make it in athletics they have another career to fall back to( All junior athletes its mandatory to go to school atleast complete highschool). (Others are being recruited into Kenya police, kenya defence forces, kenya prisons etc. But lets be honest a college degree in USA every kenyan will fight for that instead of being a mere kenyan police)

And that's why you see the rise in many kenyans seeking scholarships to NCAA because they are being advised to get education(cant afford) and invest (most don't have the capital) so the easiest is a schorlaship.

hmm, thought I saw an insta post someone just made the team from there.

Wow. What years were you on the team?

Maybe certain schools have the ability to easily supply the Kenyans with the EPO they’re accustomed to.

A tremendously long post to build up sympathy. No. Most Kenyans apparently hop on the drug train as soon as they are able to from what we’ve witnessed, as soon as an agent/manager can deliver the magic medicine. Those who respond well make it to the big time.

Yeah more likely to transfer to Utah valley or Southern Utah tbh

I agree with this. Public universities which operate off of taxpayer dollars should be primarily focused on developing American talent, both academically and athletically. Perhaps the easiest solution would be to limit the number of non-U.S. citizen scorers at NCAAs to just 1 or 2 in cross country and maybe 3 to 4 in track.