Those are some pretty wild SRs, BUT Meylan (originator of SRs) is infamous for bumping down NY SRs in order to avoid the appearance of any home-town bias. For example, this years NY/NE NXR wasn’t a mud pit, but it rained significantly for two days prior and was very chewed up and soft. However the SRs are indicating that it ran 10s faster than in 2023 which just isn’t the case and is almost certainly the reverse. Adding 6 to the Bethlehem girls SRs (essentially Implying it ran 9-10s slower than last year) is reasonable and puts them around the 135average they’ve been at, although nowhere near Vista’s outrageous average. Just my two cents, SRs are subjective, not the objective measure many people assume them to be.
Depending on the conditions, there will likely be 5-8 girls fully in contention at NXN. NXR Southwest was more akin to a track style course like Woodbridge. Dry, firm surface, flat. NXN will be very, very different and much harder to predict.
Feel bad for the Webb girls. one point from second... and doesnt look like an at large is in the cards. but most of them are still underclassmen including their best runners so next year looks promising.
This post was edited 48 seconds after it was posted.
Feel bad for the Webb girls. one point from second... and doesnt look like an at large is in the cards. but most of them are still underclassmen including their best runners so next year looks promising.
1 point is definitely rough but to even be that close with a 4th close to 19 minutes and a 5th over 19 minutes on that course is a testament to how good their top 3 are. I dont think either Cardinal Gibbons or Brentwood ran their A races today but i do think Webb just about did. They are limited by their 4-7.
Depending on the conditions, there will likely be 5-8 girls fully in contention at NXN. NXR Southwest was more akin to a track style course like Woodbridge. Dry, firm surface, flat. NXN will be very, very different and much harder to predict.
She beat last year’s champ by 40 seconds. She’s in a league of her own.
Depending on the conditions, there will likely be 5-8 girls fully in contention at NXN. NXR Southwest was more akin to a track style course like Woodbridge. Dry, firm surface, flat. NXN will be very, very different and much harder to predict.
She beat last year’s champ by 40 seconds. She’s in a league of her own.
Worth remembering Elizabeth Leachman was "in a league of her own" entering NXN last year -- then tried to time trial the race in cold, windy, wet conditions and faded to 15th. She did learn her lesson and went on to win Foot Locker in excellent conditions a week later.
Or, recall Rachel Forsythe -- who just finished 15th at NCAAs -- who was also setting records with every race throughout the 2023 xc season, took the lead when Leachman fell back, then fell back herself to 5th.
And, remember what happened to big pre-meet favorites L&L Young from the year before. If the weather and course at Glendoveer Golf Course are anything like last year or most years past, folly picking a winner.
Agree with Kinabalu above: results from these board-flat courses like Woodbridge & NXR Southwest are extremely deceiving; times on these courses compared to "real" xc courses like Glendeveer are virtually irrelevant.
Nonetheless, wonderful to see Jane Hedengren healthy and fully fit. She's certainly deserving of the national record.
Feel bad for the Webb girls. one point from second... and doesnt look like an at large is in the cards. but most of them are still underclassmen including their best runners so next year looks promising.
1 point is definitely rough but to even be that close with a 4th close to 19 minutes and a 5th over 19 minutes on that course is a testament to how good their top 3 are. I dont think either Cardinal Gibbons or Brentwood ran their A races today but i do think Webb just about did. They are limited by their 4-7.
their top runner, Areheart, almost kicked her way to the win which would have been an epic way to get the team qualification for her teammates. was in 6th late in the race and chased down everyone but the winner in the last half mile, including Cheeseman the prohibitive favorite. and came within 3 seconds of the winner after being a good 10 seconds behind her. one of the twins seem to indicate she may have gotten the last individual qualifying spot after the race but her sister, who finished 20 something, was inconsolable at the finish.
I know very little about the winner, Lowen. her top times last year were over 20 minutes. got 150th place at the 2023 Junior Olympics. then blew up in her sophomore year. and now this. from some tiny little town in western Georgia where she seems to be the only girl on her high school team and is faster than all the boys on the boys team. same coach since middle school. no private coaching. took the lead from the gun and held off every attempt to chase her down. pretty impressive.
Regardless of the Desert Twilight conditions, 72+ and sunny is not ideal racing temperatures.
Let me help put Hedengren's run in perspective. Hutchins ran 15:58 at RunningLane, the same course where Sahlman and the Youngs went 14:03, 14:05, 14:05. The top boy in the. Southwest didn't even run the fastest time of the weekend, going 14:23.
When I saw her start, I said, well, she's winning by a landslide. She's that good and the reason she entered the #1 ranked runner in the country.
Feel bad for the Webb girls. one point from second... and doesnt look like an at large is in the cards. but most of them are still underclassmen including their best runners so next year looks promising.
Good thing Cardinal Gibbons and Brentwood made it though. Both are senior heavy teams
Feel bad for the Webb girls. one point from second... and doesnt look like an at large is in the cards. but most of them are still underclassmen including their best runners so next year looks promising.
James Robinson (5th at NXR) also has their 1-6 coming back. Right now on paper, both teams look like the 2 favorites in the SE next year and are also both looking to have a large 4-5 gap unless someone new that’s really good comes in and closes that gap
Those are some pretty wild SRs, BUT Meylan (originator of SRs) is infamous for bumping down NY SRs in order to avoid the appearance of any home-town bias. For example, this years NY/NE NXR wasn’t a mud pit, but it rained significantly for two days prior and was very chewed up and soft. However the SRs are indicating that it ran 10s faster than in 2023 which just isn’t the case and is almost certainly the reverse. Adding 6 to the Bethlehem girls SRs (essentially Implying it ran 9-10s slower than last year) is reasonable and puts them around the 135average they’ve been at, although nowhere near Vista’s outrageous average. Just my two cents, SRs are subjective, not the objective measure many people assume them to be.
SR are hugely subjective, particularly when trying to put them in a historical context. They aren’t something as precise as LAACTIC, no way.
The speed ratings for NY and NE look completely fair to me, maybe even a little generous, for a lot of the teams and runners I'm familiar with that looked like they ran up to expectations. Maybe Bethlehem just had a relatively bad race for them?
Did anyone else happen to notice how deep Vista's girls team is? That's something worth mentioning. I think there is no questions about who will win NXN.
This is great analysis. There are too many truly elite girls in the race to clearly predict a winner based on what was an incredible time at a very different style course. Hills, turns, cold, mud are all great equalizers.
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