His resume is fine but there are many, many great runners that aren’t coached by Smith.
He ran a terrible race at the NCAA XC championships and every college runner has a chance to improve. What point are you trying to make?
His point is Smith has a very high hit rate. Even the guys who aren’t world-beaters like Hasty/Quax show steady improvement. Generally if a runner is going to be a stud it won’t happen after Smith, which demonstrates he’s getting a lot out of his runners.
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
He's been in the top 50 of NCAA cross 4 times now. That's certainly well above his high school level. Track has been a struggle but 13:42 (run multiple times) is better than those high school marks, 7:49 was a big PB, and we'll see if he's turned a corner. I wouldn't call being a top contributor to national champs in XC and progressing to 7:49/13:42 a "miss."
This post was edited 3 minutes after it was posted.
His point is Smith has a very high hit rate. Even the guys who aren’t world-beaters like Hasty/Quax show steady improvement. Generally if a runner is going to be a stud it won’t happen after Smith, which demonstrates he’s getting a lot out of his runners.
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
I disagree. Who has been more consistent year after year than Hasty. I agree he’s not making world teams but the guy shows up on the day when it counts. As for your statement about 2x the number? How so? Look at the Oregon/Stanford /BYU/ ok st. Type of teams. They many times have just as many year after year. We forget about them because they aren’t doing as much… Smith not only keeps his stud recruits consistently good he elevates the non blue chip recruits to a greater level. obviously so do some other coaches… but just look at the HS prs of his women’s team for example and what they are doing now. The lates USTFCCA event rankings, Women’s 5k are 2nd in the country.
Was never a fan md kids going to teams competing for Xc titles
How about a team dynamic rivaled by few, miles and miles of trails vs concrete, coaches who care about longevity rather than immediate results? World class facilities? Oh and 7k feet altitude just walking around to class and sleeping…
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
He's been in the top 50 of NCAA cross 4 times now. That's certainly well above his high school level. Track has been a struggle but 13:42 (run multiple times) is better than those high school marks, 7:49 was a big PB, and we'll see if he's turned a corner. I wouldn't call being a top contributor to national champs in XC and progressing to 7:49/13:42 a "miss."
For someone with Hasty’s talent, those times are pretty meh and, on their own, would indicate Smith is not much of a coach. The truth, of course, is that there are factors that no coach can control. Stahlman had a terrible XC season, but I doubt Smith is to blame
He's been in the top 50 of NCAA cross 4 times now. That's certainly well above his high school level. Track has been a struggle but 13:42 (run multiple times) is better than those high school marks, 7:49 was a big PB, and we'll see if he's turned a corner. I wouldn't call being a top contributor to national champs in XC and progressing to 7:49/13:42 a "miss."
For someone with Hasty’s talent, those times are pretty meh and, on their own, would indicate Smith is not much of a coach. The truth, of course, is that there are factors that no coach can control. Stahlman had a terrible XC season, but I doubt Smith is to blame
You'd have been better off omitting the first sentence. The second sentence applies to all coaches. The best way to judge a coach is over a long period of time. No coach has a perfect record of developing every athlete.
Was never a fan md kids going to teams competing for Xc titles
I agree, but is Sahlman really a md guy? The mile is his best event, but he also showed great range up to 5k in hs last year, and is way better at the 2-mile than 800. I typically look at guys like Makhloufi, Wightman, Brazier, Symmonds as md guys. I don't know what you would call guys like Sahlman, Jakob, Webb who have range all the way from 800-10k.
For someone with Hasty’s talent, those times are pretty meh and, on their own, would indicate Smith is not much of a coach. The truth, of course, is that there are factors that no coach can control. Stahlman had a terrible XC season, but I doubt Smith is to blame
You'd have been better off omitting the first sentence. The second sentence applies to all coaches. The best way to judge a coach is over a long period of time. No coach has a perfect record of developing every athlete.
Another part is recruiting the best athletes. Having Salazar and Chapa worked out well for Dellinger and then would have been good at many other schools.
At least Sahlman is showing up and competing. He ran NCAA x-c and has done 13:42 and 3:38...good times for a freshman. Prefontaine did 13:39 as a freshman and a 3:57 mile, so Sahlman is at that level.
Contrast Sahlman - a competitor - with Rheinhardt Harrison, a non-competitor. He has done nothing his freshman year after a 3:59 last year.
This post was edited 18 seconds after it was posted.
You'd have been better off omitting the first sentence. The second sentence applies to all coaches. The best way to judge a coach is over a long period of time. No coach has a perfect record of developing every athlete.
Another part is recruiting the best athletes. Having Salazar and Chapa worked out well for Dellinger and then would have been good at many other schools.
This is largely true. We can all point to those athletes who came out of nowhere to succeed in college but they're a small number compared to those who already showed success in high school. As to why some athletes show enormous improvement in college of course there's coaching. But beyond that there are so many factors. Is the athlete still physically maturing when he/she enters college? Are the high school performances based on low mileage and/or not the best coaching? Does the athlete become more serious in training?
With all these HSers running sub 840 and 400 are they burned out by the time they get to college?
Don't have stats in front of me but just thinking about the very good mid distance guys in the DMV area and very few of them improved greatly in college. They plateau after their soph years.
His point is Smith has a very high hit rate. Even the guys who aren’t world-beaters like Hasty/Quax show steady improvement. Generally if a runner is going to be a stud it won’t happen after Smith, which demonstrates he’s getting a lot out of his runners.
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
Hasty was coached by Guy Avery as a high schooler. If you look more closely, you'll notice that none of Coach Avery's kids PR until late in their college career. Hmmmmm.
I think Smith is a great coach but to be honest he has average hit rate. NAU at any given time has 2x the number of stud recruits on its roster as other schools.
Btw, Hasty is/was a world beater at the HS level and should be considered a miss.
He ran 4:00 / 8:00 in HS in March 2018. Ran his first PR in February of 2023.
He's been in the top 50 of NCAA cross 4 times now. That's certainly well above his high school level. Track has been a struggle but 13:42 (run multiple times) is better than those high school marks, 7:49 was a big PB, and we'll see if he's turned a corner. I wouldn't call being a top contributor to national champs in XC and progressing to 7:49/13:42 a "miss."
I agree with you on this. Top 50 in Cross in any era, but especially these days is significant. His Track times now, are good and okay 3 and 5. Those times just a few years ago, would be in the "really solid to good" category. 7:49 is still solid. And as someone else said, it's no certainty. that a great HS'er will improve a ton, all the time. I think Sahlman is and will be fine, 3:38.x this early is well ahead of last year..even if it only converts about .5-.7 faster. 13:42 for a 1:48..3:38 guy is kind of really good. Probably could break 13:40 in a month. And thats still good for a frosh. I think Martin will be the same way, he has run 3:40.xx in not as good conditions. One of the things people take for granted is the amount of set up opptys. there are today, so the jump off point to College is lower than ever before.. they(opptys) are everywhere. HS..and certainly college and open. While they existed before up the line, not nearly as much for elite HS'ers as now. And I never thought that while talented that Reinhardt Harrison would ever be a dominat next level guy, no matter how fast he ran, and he did run fast. "Hot house flower TT'er" type who raced none of the top guys..and there were a ton out there to find. Now , two seasons in a row..not one result? hmm
NAU frosh Colin Sahlman finished second to Iowa State's Ezekiel Rop in section 3 of the men's 1500 at Bryan Clay in 3:38.30. Rop won in 3:36.92.Website: http...
Boy is that a hype link? His 3:56.x mile and this mark are like .6 apart on the conversions, is that massive? Does FloTrack need to do this to drive traffic?
My opinion on CS, and I’ve said it here before, is that he was not an all time HS great. He was simply the best of his class. He ran *all time great times* but there were so many factors that propelled him to that: SoCal weather, elite coaching, super spikes, tracks, amazing races he got into and of course the absolutely once in a lifetime insane team he was a part of. These turned what likely would have been a really really good national level runner into the no1 guy. And the timing of being no1- 2022 post explosion- meant his times look otherworldly and falsely put him on some Jim Ryun like tier.
All that said, every single year’s no1 guy has a decent chance to have a slow start to college and sometimes even be a bust. He’s had the slower start and time will tell where he ends up but at least he’s run slightly faster than his HS times now, which is positive.
But this isn’t an Alan Webb level talent here where we need to scrutinize every workout and race. This is more like Centro, who was no1 in his class, took a minute to develop and eventually figured it out. There are countless other Centros who didn’t ever get it rolling. Just how it goes.