DEAR VIN LANANNA: Here are the reasons to have regionals

Like someone deeper than top 20 actually has a shot...

This system is garbage.. whats wrong with how indoors is run?

wenis prinkle wrote:

Like someone deeper than top 20 actually has a shot...

This system is garbage.. whats wrong with how indoors is run?

OK, wenis, check back with us after the regionals. You'll see that dozens of qualifiers whose names were not in the top 20 on the descending order list will be going to the NCAA Championships. Those are the guys (and women) that deserve a fair shot on the basis of competition to proceed to the championships.

If regionals are so bad, why aren't we trying to eliminate them in cross country?

I get that it's apples and oranges in many respects (e.g. comparing times, different heats, duration of meet, thus cost, cost when school is out of session, etc.) but isn't the rudimentary intent to send the fastest athletes in mid Nov. to the NCAAs? Doesn't a regional track system accomplish something similar?

Don't know if its been mentioned yet, I haven't read the entire board, but maybe a mid-season date can be set to accept qualifying times. Like, set a date in the middle of the season that "qualifying" times could be accepted. That could potentially solve the problem of the runner that hits a qualifying time early in the season, then tanks.

Maybe if you do set a good time before the mid-season date, you could still use it if you hit a similar (slightly slower) time after the mid-season qualifying date.

Moral of the story: Qualifying times could be accepted later in the season proving that the runners hitting those times would be capable of running them at the Championships.

Decent solution?

4 sure wrote:

I hit all 3 standards. Midwest/East Coast meets off the top of my head:

NC State

Georgia Tech

Louisville

Sea Ray

Penn Relays

Jesse Owens

Hillsdale

I am sure I am missing some that could/would/should have fast 1500 meter races and down.

In a 5 - 10 hour drive you should be able to hit at least 1 of these meets of you live in that area, if not 2 or 3.

All those meets are over 5 hours of a drive. 2 guys it the Q at Sea Rays and it was the first time that has happen in a long time. Only meet within 10 hours of us.

NC State is over 10 hours, Louisville over 10 hours, Penn Relays over 10 hours, Jesse Owens and Hillsdale over 10 hours.

You really don't have a clue. We have to do a lot of work to find a quailty field for our athletes.

I think the point wenis was making was that if you aren't in the top 20 fastest times, you don't really have a shot at winning. And he's probably right. All of this changing things around ultimately affects the middle to back part of the field, not the front-runners. The vast majority of contenders will make it whether it is by time, regional, or whatever. So basically, people are trying to pick the best method to fill the field up. And since there is an argument to be made that whoever you fill it with doesn't matter that much, since the best of each event will make it, I can see the point of going with the cheaper system. Lets face it, budget times are tough, and are likely going to stay tough for a few years. I suspect the money aspect was the main driver here.

la la land wrote:

wenis prinkle wrote:

Like someone deeper than top 20 actually has a shot...

This system is garbage.. whats wrong with how indoors is run?

OK, wenis, check back with us after the regionals. You'll see that dozens of qualifiers whose names were not in the top 20 on the descending order list will be going to the NCAA Championships. Those are the guys (and women) that deserve a fair shot on the basis of competition to proceed to the championships.

name::::;:;: wrote:

If regionals are so bad, why aren't we trying to eliminate them in cross country?

I get that it's apples and oranges in many respects (e.g. comparing times, different heats, duration of meet, thus cost, cost when school is out of session, etc.) but isn't the rudimentary intent to send the fastest athletes in mid Nov. to the NCAAs? Doesn't a regional track system accomplish something similar?

First off, regionals in cross country are a little more "regional" as opposed to flying halfway across the country.

Second, cross country is 7 man teams, you can hold out a couple guys if you are a good team at the conference or regional meet in order to save something for nationals.

Thirdly, running a 10K at conference, then at regionals, then at NCAA's on the track is a lot harder than running 8K xc conference and then 10K's at regionals and ncaas. Especially since with track you are often compelled to double runners at the conference meet, if not at NCAA's (and with the "regional system" at regionals too).

That's a LOT more difficult than the qualifying system in cross country.

The only argument here is that if you think conference doesn't matter. That's a lame argument and if you are in favor of the little man it makes even less sense since this might be their biggest stage to score points for their team with a lot on the line. Conference is the true competition of teams, whereas NCAA's is the true competition of the select elites of the best teams.

What regionals does is give guys who haven't run fast enough a shot to make NCAA's at the expense of making most of the true contenders run needless rounds and risk injury or just plain fatigue when it counts.

It's great to let the little guys have a shot to go to the big show to get lapped or left way back, but in the true development of our sport and for seeing the most exciting races at NCAA's it's counter productive.

I think that's kind of the point, if you truly deserve to be at NCAA's you could have hit your mark during the season either at Penn, Stanford, Cardinal, Mt. Sac or just a decent race anywhere. If Robby Andrews can run 3:40 and 1:47 at a regualar meet, why should he have to go to a regional meet to prove himself again? Goes for all the true players.

because there is more to the sport of track and field than just middle distance and distance running.

the sprints and field events have centimeters and hundreths of seconds separating dozens of quality people. Wind and temperatures can jumble the "qualifying order" significantly

All of this risk of injury/fatigue talk is a stretch at best. 8k, 10k, 10k within a month on hills, uneven terrain, etc. isn't AT LEAST as big of a risk to injury/fatigue as running laps on a track?

Additionally, what few in the "anti-regionals" argument are addressing is peaking at the right time, which regionals accounts for. You can run your 28:45 at the March Stanford meet but that doesn't mean you know how to race in any other situation other than a time trial, or that you're actually fit/peaked by the time NCAAs roll around.

I'm not saying CC regionals = Track regionals, or that regionals are a perfect system...but CC regionals do serve a valid purpose, and many of the benefits would apply to a track regional system as well.

Name::::::::::::;:::: wrote:

All of this risk of injury/fatigue talk is a stretch at best. 8k, 10k, 10k within a month on hills, uneven terrain, etc. isn't AT LEAST as big of a risk to injury/fatigue as running laps on a track?

A) XC is largely soft surface, while you do have the chance or rolling an ankle (though the probability of it being a worse injury than if you rolled it on that curb you run next to for 25 laps in a 10K is very low) you have far less impact. Not only that, but XC breaks up rythm and movement, giving the lateral muscles a break that is not afforded on the constant grind of track running Have you actually raced 10K's on the track? A 5K on the track is probably closer to 10K cross. There's a reason why cross country is thought to be more fun and a 5K or 10K on the track is more dreaded.

With short races on the track, you can't even compare those to cross country where the majority of the race is spread out. On the track there is pushing, jostling, tripping and spiking happening all the time.

Why increase the probability of that when you DON'T HAVE TO?

B) Good teams in cross can substitute a runner or 2 or 3 or switch them between conference, regionals and NCAA cross and they do it all the time.

It is obvious that any system has it's advantages and disadvantages.

The current system, while definitely expensive for everyone, does incorporate descending order list and head-to-head competition. You definitely need some of both. (The BCS system is basically a descending order list with obvious media bias, but does have some head-to-head competition in the conference champion qualification. If NCAA basketball only used descending order lists--won/loss records, would it still be March Madness?)

If you think we had to chase times this year, wait until next year. With 17 or 24 (depending on which proposal is approved) qualifiers based on descending order of times, almost everyone will be chasing times until the final deadline. Even if you are among the top ten and you don't run on the final weekend, you could get knocked off by runners at Georgia Tech Invitational, IC4As, or any other top meet.

Maybe a qualifying standard similar to Indoors with the two weekend championship format would be more palatable. But, then how many schools can afford to send athletes for 8-10 days? On yeah, the big schools with football-endowed budgets.

Let the chasing begin. Palo Alto is now accepting room reservations . . .

Don't be mad because your coaches are too lazy or incompetent to set up or at least help set up a fast race in the middle of the season. Descending order works and it makes for a fast paced meet at nationals so the fans don't have to sit through a 4 hour meet..

dd wrote:

I think the point wenis was making was that if you aren't in the top 20 fastest times, you don't really have a shot at winning. And he's probably right.

Our sport is about competition, not time trials. A descending order qualifying rewards the athletes for their April and early May performances, and penalizes those who got off to a delayed start or timed their peaks properly.

All this talk of cross country - if you're going to have a regional meet in track, use the same regions as cross country. That'd be in the 30-40 school per meet range, it is in fact regional to the schools involved. Say you have two guaranteed spots per event per region, and then add in however many at-large from the NDL.

...a real college coach wrote:

4 sure wrote:

I hit all 3 standards. Midwest/East Coast meets off the top of my head:

NC State

Georgia Tech

Louisville

Sea Ray

Penn Relays

Jesse Owens

Hillsdale

I am sure I am missing some that could/would/should have fast 1500 meter races and down.

In a 5 - 10 hour drive you should be able to hit at least 1 of these meets of you live in that area, if not 2 or 3.

All those meets are over 5 hours of a drive. 2 guys it the Q at Sea Rays and it was the first time that has happen in a long time. Only meet within 10 hours of us.

NC State is over 10 hours, Louisville over 10 hours, Penn Relays over 10 hours, Jesse Owens and Hillsdale over 10 hours.

You really don't have a clue. We have to do a lot of work to find a quailty field for our athletes.

Well, then you would fall under the part that said "if you live in that area." Obviously you don't live near Ohio, WV, PA, KY, TN, SC, NC, GA, IN.

So where do you live? Based off your knock on the west coast, you led me to believe near the area I described.

I meant: wouldn't fall under

malmo wrote:

dd wrote:

I think the point wenis was making was that if you aren't in the top 20 fastest times, you don't really have a shot at winning. And he's probably right.

Our sport is about competition, not time trials. A descending order qualifying rewards the athletes for their April and early May performances, and penalizes those who got off to a delayed start or timed their peaks properly.

Well, yes. There's a blinding flash of the obvious. My point was that however you pick the competitors for nationals, the guys that will be in the mix for the podium at the bell lap can make it based on time, regional system, or even letsrun polling. I'm sure there is the odd exception, but for instance in the 10k last year, no matter how you chose the field, rupp, chelanga, and forrest were going to make it. Thus, if 2 systems get all the "real players" there, but only differ in the mid to back-of-the-pack entries, eventually those that run the sport will choose the least costly option.

Forget all this nonsense and scrap the NCAA system for running and instead start a club system in this country, with different clubs for different event types.

The meets would be shorter, coaches wouldn't train people out of their specialty, and distance runners wouldn't be forced to race an insane amount and the Universities would save money because track and XC is not a money maker.

I agree that holding Regionals in the same regions as cross country would make sense, EXCEPT for the fact that no one wants to hold Regional meets (THEY LOSE TOO MUCH MONEY BECAUSE FANS AREN'T INTERESTED IN THEM). Now, if it is these "small programs" who apparently want Regional meets, let them be the host sites. Why should the bigger programs, who want nothing to do with Regionals have to hold a meet that they don't want, and loses buckets of money?

The OP and supporters just don't get it...FANS WON'T PAY TO WATCH REGIONALS, THE MAJOR T&F PROGRAMS DON'T WANT THEM, THEY ARE HARD ON THE ATHLETES (especially the distance runners), THEY DON'T CHANGE THE EVENTUAL CHAMPIONSHIP MIX FOR TOP PLACINGS, THEY ARE TOO EXPENSIVE and TIME CONSUMING..... VIN, these are a few of the reasons why you are justified in asking the question of WHY?