Why isn't Cornell better?

Those born into wealth just don't tend to have the fire in the belly to do what it takes to succeed to high levels. When they've been handed whatever they wanted all their lives then they think just wanting something is enough to ensure that it'll happen. Not that easy, it turns out. But of course there are probably outside factors to blame.

Plus there's a big difference between choosing a tough courseload and picking the easy classes. If you don't to be challenged, just look at median grade reports and pick a schedule based on that (classes like Swahili, Hotelie Personal Finance, etc.).

How is this thread still going on? How did you come to pick on Cornell? Cornell is very impressive in the middle and longer distances, and last year came in 2nd to Princeton at XC Heps and this year without their #2 guy (Dannemiller - 8:48 steeple) came in 3rd. Perhaps Cornell is off the expected pace that a young coach arbitrarily predicted when he came to the team, but this is no reason to rag on the program. You're talking about a team that scored 67 points last indoor heps from middle and long distances alone (good for 4th in team scoring).

Sorry, I just don't exactly get why everyone is so eager to jump on a pretty successful looking program.

Big deal, it's "heps."

I seem to recall reading an article a few years back that said something to the fact that the Ivy League had announced that from now on, all students coming from families making less than X dollars a year would get awarded full need-based scholarships.

This article is specifically about Harvard, but I thought I remembered seeing an article shortly thereafter saying the rest of the Ivy League had followed suite. Apologies if I am incorrect.

If I'm not, though, that's a pretty big carrot for intelligent distance runners from the middle-to-lower-class.

http://blog.howtogetin.com/harvard-announces-sweeping-middle-income-initiative/72/

Big West, Big Sky, A10 wrote:

Big deal, it's "heps."

Don't teams in the heps conference have a right to be compared to other teams in the heps conference? Why should I compare a team that offers no scholarships to one that does?

Also if you want to tell me how you'd fare in a heps meet, please do so.

the entire ivy league doesn't have the finances to just all of a sudden give out full need based scholarships to a large number of people. Yes, many have ramped up their need-based aid, but you still have to have a pretty low income.

it depends on the school. cornell is not giving out the kind of aid that Harvard is.

middle class gets you basically ZIP.

Well, gonna defend my former team here.

CU has had 4 individual qualifiers for NCAA cross since 2004, this year being the third in a row to send a guy. None of those guys were big studs in high school either. Hyde ran 8:51 for 3k in high school, probably not much better than a 9:30 for 3,200, and he made All-American at NCAAs. Canaday was a 4:09 1,500, 8:46 3k guy in high school and 13th in his state meet in cross, which made him one of the guys with the least high school credentials to make NCAAs in 2007. Hine was a good cross runner as a prep and ran 4:16 in track, so he was good recruit but still not as good as over 90% of the guys that made NCAAs last year. This year, Edelman, a 9:31 high schooler, has qualified. So the TEAMS haven't done anything special and Rojo probably has to admit he's been humbled by how tough it was going to be to get a single team to the show, let alone do it every year. But nobody can back it up if they say CU hasn't developed runners, even in cross, although we've been a lot better in track. If anything, it's the guys that have had less than stellar high school careers that have done the best here. That's called development. We might have a guy or two every year who have been disappointments, but we have no more of those than any other team in the country has.

In a sort of ironic twist after all the big talk about cross back in 2003, Rojo's guys haven't made much team noise in any fall season, but they've done really well for themselves in track. Somehow, they've dominated the distance events in the Heps the last two years with recruits that wouldn't have gotten much of a look from Princeton. Miller had a 2nd and a 1st in the indoor mile the last two years, Hine won two indoor 5ks and one 10k and got 2nd to Canaday in the 10k the year before. Edelman was 2nd to Hine in the 10k this year. Hine scored 70 points in Heps meets in his college career, the most of any pure distance runner (3k and up) in a Heps career this decade.

Last year alone, CU had:

* A 1:56 high schooler ran 1:50 both indoors and outdoors; he also ran a 2:24 1k and a 1:49 split on a 9:35 Ivy record indoor DMR.

* A 1:53/4:11 high schooler ran 3:41, 4:01 indoor mile and 7:59 indoors and made NCAAs in the 1,500. This was a good recruit, but the vast majority of 4:11 high school 1,600 runners never sniff NCAAs.

* A 4:25 high schooler ran 4:04 in the mile, won the indoor conference, anchored the conference champion DMR and ran a 4:00+ split on the DMR the next week.

* A 9:05 high schooler ran 2:25, 3:48, 4:07 relay mile, 8:48 steeple and made NCAAs in the steeple. This is good recruit, but Princeton had 7 on their team last year who were faster in high school, so the bar is higher than people think and 9:05 ain't some superstar these days.

* Three runners whose high school PRs were 4:16 (worth about 9:15 3,200?), 9:31 and 8:46 3k (about 9:24 3,200?) ran 29:09, 29:31 and 29:47 in the 10k. All have qualified for NCAA cross. This is FAR above typical development. Under the radar was a 9:53 high schooler who ran 30:19 last year and scored in the Heps 10k.

* The DMR ran an Ivy indoor record of 9:35 with only one blue chip recruit on the squad and without the top miler, who was spiked and injured the week before. Was this race short because there was no rail? If so, maybe we don't have the Ivy record after all ... oh, wait, we do - a 9:37 from 2005.

* The 4 x mile team ran 16:25 for 4th at Championship of America, the 5th fastest college time in the country in 2009. This squad's high school PRs added up to 17:13. When was the last time a team made of guys with PRs that averaged 4:18 in high school ran 16:25? Anyone? Anyone? Maybe some team has - just asking - but if they did, I'm impressed. Our 2005 team ran 16:29 with a quartet that averaged 4:19 for high school PRs.

* Rojo was named Northeast Region Assistant Coach of the Year for the indoor season after 4 school records during the season, 3 individual conference champions, a relay championship, the most distance points in the conference meet and the indoor team title.

There's no justification for saying CU's runners don't develop. In fact, try to name which ones HAVEN'T developed here and see if there isn't an even bigger list of washouts from almost any other team in the country.

All of their good runners jumped off the gorge.

You're saying that none of the Cornell runners are on any sort of scholarship?

horses arse wrote:

Big West, Big Sky, A10 wrote:

Big deal, it's "heps."

Don't teams in the heps conference have a right to be compared to other teams in the heps conference? Why should I compare a team that offers no scholarships to one that does?

Also if you want to tell me how you'd fare in a heps meet, please do so.

Angel is the centerfold wrote:

* A 1:56 high schooler ran 1:50 both indoors and outdoors; he also ran a 2:24 1k and a 1:49 split on a 9:35 Ivy record indoor DMR.

1:58, actually.

For the record, can I please explain to everyone that there is no "SUNY-Cornell." I went to Cornell, every Cornell student fills out the same application. Back in the early 1900s the State of New York gave land to Cornell University. As part of that deal, and for continued funding in the future, a handful of the schools at Cornell give breaks to New York residents. Meaning, because these schools are funded by New York then New York residents get tuition breaks (which is not at all as cheap as normal in-state tuition for a state school). There is no SUNY-Cornell.

There's this thing called the "jo-level."

Ergo, everything on this site is executed to mediocre results.

Poor web design.

Poor Logo.

Poor tagline.

Poor writing. Poor grammar. Poor spelling.

Immature and stupid headlines.

Narcissistic headlines...

The list could go on, everyone who visits here knows that it has the lowest execution and quality control of any of the running sites out there.

And so, Wejo coaches to the same level of quality standards here.

To perform to the Johnson brothers level, most people would have to AIM to do WORSE than they know they are capable of.

Graphic design is just bullshit dressing for content, and letsrun has the best content of any running website out there. Also rojo is the coach of Cornell, not Wejo.

The real heart of the issue comes down to the coaching and recruiting. I'd say Rojo doesn't do a very good job with the recruiting especially for cross country. He's also not a very experienced coach. His philosophy is not one that will generate immediate results or make middle of the road talent national class. Cornell's freshmen never run well. Why? The Rojo / Kellogg philosophy takes a lot of time to build the strength to run well - if you don't get hurt along the way. The last class of freshmen at Cornell that actually ran varsity cross country was also the last one to win Heps (as seniors) and go to NCAA cross (as juniors). Which, crazily enough, was recruited by Vin Lanana!!! Bet you didn't know he accepted the Cornell job then backed out just before school started and then left for Stanford a year later. Oh what could have been...

Oh that's just poppycock saying he can't recruit! Just look at this roster of outstanding young men!!

http://cornellbigred.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=12066&path=mcross

http://cornellbigred.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=12727&path=mcross

http://cornellbigred.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=12065&path=mcross

http://cornellbigred.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=12069&path=mcross

Big West, Big Sky, A10 wrote:

You're saying that none of the Cornell runners are on any sort of scholarship?

Scholarship and financial aid are different. Within the Ivy League, financial aid is granted on a need-based system, not merit-based. They know that the majority of the applicants are smart enough to be in the school. But since money for college is a growing concern in this country, the Ivy League schools try to give them the opportunity to attend by offering these very generous financial aid packages. In some cases, the packages are much more generous than what some state or other larger private schools can offer (or at least in my case when I applied in 2002).

From my understanding, the only way "athletics" plays a roll in the admissions process is when a coach gives a listing to the admission officers to tell them that they should give an extra look at these people because the coaches believe they can improve their teams. This does not lead to any sort of extra money. If anything, it may help in getting into the school if you are on the edge of getting in on academics alone.

Cornell has been a force on the track and their distance guys' improvement from their hs times is phenomenal. To take decent hs runners and make them into 30:00 or faster 10k guys, 4:low milers, etc is impressive to say the least. Few coaches have the ability to get their athletes to manage that.

Given that, it is surprising that they don't do better in cross. Its sort of the opposite of my alma mater (Columbia). Outside of the 1500 and 800 guys, the 5k/10k crew just doesn't get it done on the track. These are guys who routinely compete for the win in cross, can run 5:00 pace or faster over hill and dale, but have a hard time breaking 14:30 or 30:30 on the track. Its a bit strange given how good they are in cross.

I would guess Cornell just doesn't have the depth through 5 in cross. Did most of those track performances mentioned above happen during the same year?

Or they just aren't as fired up about cross as some other teams. I mean it is clear that Iona, Columbia and even Providence and Syracuse FOCUS 100% on cross. Whatever happens in track (for the distance guys) seems to be gravy... but cross is where it is at.

I would guess, for the Cornell crew, maybe track is where its at. Or at least they are more pulled between both sports rather then putting all their efforts into one sport.

Having said all that, its not like Cornell hasn't done well. They've easily been a top 50 team in the country routinely. Unfortunately, our sport does not reward the top 50. You gotta be a bit better then that and make Nationals or else you get a thread about how you stink.

Thank you DellH. I should have looked it up rather than just going by hearsay. For those interested you can find info on the Cornell-SUNY relationship here:

http://www.openhouse.cornell.edu/qqs.cfm?q=4

Also thanks to Angel for some info on their track performances. I had really only looked at XC and haven't really followed northeast college track in some years. While the track times/improvements are interesting it is a biased sample and I would have to be much more knowledge about improvements on other teams to make a comparison. He certainly isn't doing a bad job though.