OSU 2020 CC nationals course.....seriously??

someName wrote:

Very nice article, and I'm sure the irrigation and manicuring is certainly state-of-the-art as they claim.

Reading about courses like this however, makes me sad and wonder about the missed opportunities to provide a truly challenging cross-country experience. If you are designing a course on grounds essentially from scratch, what is the rationale to not include any "features" that differentiate the experience from being a grass road race? Nothing wrong with manicured sections, or even a wholly grass course.

For aesthetic reasons as well as for the good of the sport there should be mud, water, rough terrain, barriers, etc. Even in this article they boast about the course offering multiple loops as a shared-use facility, why include something like "pro-lines?"

Not as if there are many "true" cross-country courses in regular use, but it is sad to see course design reduced to grass paths.

I have read posts here and in the coaches Facesbook group that were like yours where someone is interested in water, mud and barriers. Some say they would like courses that are more like European cross country courses. I do prefer to see cross country course somewhere other than golf courses.

In high school I ran on a course that had a tough hill. At a big invitational someone fell and suffered a compound break in their leg. I've seen to many injuries in running and don't want to see a runner seriously hurt due to poor footing. I don't want the course conditions to be a feature that adds humor as the crowd hopes to get a laugh at watching the runners fall in the water or mud. I don't want athletes running through water late in the season when regionals and nationals are held in places like Buffalo, Madison and Terre Haute. The cold makes it tough enough without getting soaked or by running through mud that may suck one's shoes off. I don't want cross country to turn into something like a difficult trail race or a tough mudder. I thought the footing was great in Madison for regional this year until after the men ran one section for the 1st of 2 times. It became very muddy so even with a course that supposedly has good drainage the sod can get muddy and slippery.

Dromano19 wrote:

You can read about the specifics here:

https://okstate.com/sports/2015/3/17/GEN_20140101115.aspx?path=xct

Most important spec has been left out: is the course Rupp certified?

This is just dumb. A course doesn’t have to have mud or barriers or other “features” to be challenging. The OSU course was very challenging. It’s not a pancake course like you see some of these teams try to run. If the conditions are such that mud is possible, I’m sure the course can get muddy or soggy or whatever. The conditions were good so the course was good. You want to intentionally implement mud? For a national championship? Get off it.

Seriously you guys will complain about anything. OSU literally poured millions of dollars into creating a beautiful facility for a sport that constantly gets little-to-no attention/money/facilities/etc. and you guys still find some nonsense to complain about.

Get a grip.

I said the footing is great but made 2 critical comments: 1) it’s going to be a bad course for spectators at nationals next year. 2) It’s not a good course for men’s regionals due to the difficulty. None of you have refuted either of these points.