In 1984 I ran 15 5k cross-country races in high school is this still normal?

coahc wrote:

My old HS coach sent me our school program from 1984 and from August 29th till November 10 I ran 15 races. I am just wonder what a high school runner's season looks like these days? How many races did you have?

Around 6-7 normal races and 3-4 post season

Going off memory,

in HS I competed for my school 5 times. The last 3 were 5ks.

Then 3 races or so with club once the school season ended.. They were 6k, 6k and 8k.

8 races about.

lke_4:25 wrote:

coahc wrote:

My old HS coach sent me our school program from 1984 and from August 29th till November 10 I ran 15 races. I am just wonder what a high school runner's season looks like these days? How many races did you have?

Around 6-7 normal races and 3-4 post season

^This. We basically mirrored the high school football season. Friday night football game, then a Saturday morning cross country meet. Every fall sport started the same weekend, and the 10 week football season took us through the Regional meet, which we never missed. Week 11 was football playoffs and the State meet.

Scanning athletic.net, that is on the high side, but it's not too hard to find a school with 15 meets on the schedule.

In early 2000s I had 11 races on average for xc and would hop in a road race or two during season sometimes too. Top teams don't race like this but plenty of average teams do. Sometimes we had 2 races in a week, once three. One of the schools in my city hosted 6 meets a year. Others hosted 1-3.

15 wouldn't be abnormal.

About the same. Late Aug to State Meet Early Nov.

Usually a dual or tri meet midweek then major invitational Fri or Sat.

Alan

JBaller33 wrote:

lke_4:25 wrote:

Around 6-7 normal races and 3-4 post season

^This. We basically mirrored the high school football season. Friday night football game, then a Saturday morning cross country meet. Every fall sport started the same weekend, and the 10 week football season took us through the Regional meet, which we never missed. Week 11 was football playoffs and the State meet.

I kind of wish I went out for football my last yr. I had played previously and knew some guys on the team.

It didn't matter, the team was provincial champs (at the highest level). Oh well the xc team I was on was prov. champs too.

I went to one of the top jock schools. We dominated in many areas, and a lot of the students were really smart too, some Rhodes scholars.

My old high school has held the aggregate city title in track for 50 years. And cross country for about 40 years, something like that.

Track star high.

League Meets on Tuesdays. Invites on 2/3 of Saturdays. County, Section, State. I think 13 to 15 is pretty typical. Teams who run less than everybody else might only run 12 times.

The Dirty Duck wrote:

Scanning athletic.net, that is on the high side, but it's not too hard to find a school with 15 meets on the schedule.

OUr league meets do not go on athletic.net. I'm sure it's the same for a very big number of schools

As a coach in Australia last winter our males and females raced very little cross country actually only 3-4 virtual time trial events. The results were a great track season did any other coach have success without 10-15 cross country races?

Races on Thursdays and Saturdays for at least 6 weeks. I'd toss in a random Sunday 5k here and there for giggles. No one got tired or sore at age 17.

13 races

1 scrimmage

6 duals

3 invites

3 championships

I top of that we did at least one hard interval workout.

We really should of just done the races or cut back to half of those races. Way too much VO2 max work and not enough aerobic volume.

Sophomore Year of High School

5 Dual Meets

5 Invitationals

1 County

1 District

12 Total

Senior Year Of High School

2 Tri Meets

1 Dual Meet

3 Invitationals

1 County

1 District

1 State

1 NXR

10 Total

We run 5 races during the season, then conference, state qualifier, state, NXR. That is a total of 9 meets. The smallest of these meets has 10 teams. There are no silly duals or scrimmages or triangulars. All of the meets are all out efforts.

our seasons usually looked something like:

5 duals

2 invitationals at home course

1 invitational at sunken meadow

1 invitational at van cortlandt

1 invitational to preview states course

2 championships

States

NXN Regionals

14 meets. our team was good and the duals could be pretty much walked for near sweeps. but we definitely raced hard at saturday invitationals, we essentially peaked at state quals and we were kinda toasted come states.

In 1983 I did 14 races from August -November .

Raced all summer before including 3 x10km roads

Most of my varsity kids that made it to state ran 10 races

1 scrimmage

3 league cluster meets

3 invites

Sub section

Section

State

We have about 14-15 on the schedule, but many of those are for kids who won’t go deep into the post season. We also have an “either or” weekend. Either you get selected for the squad that travels to mega meet or you run on the B team at a local meet

We might not have the depth to field a competitive varsity B team this year, so I might have to move some stuff around.

Wow! That's more than one a week! How did you do?

I ran often in HS. 2-3 meets a week. I was fine.

I was talking to some kids recently, and their experience is quite different. They have districts( whatever that is) and Maybe 2 invitationals. Then states or state quals. So maybe 3-4 races a season.

And then many on the team aren’t allowed to travel unless they’re good. So they might race once or twice. To add to that, only kids that make it to districts are bought spikes. The kids race in trainers. The coaches tell the parents they don’t need special shoes unless they qualify for the big meets. Additionally the parents don’t want to spend the money unless their child shows potential.

The whole area is rather devoid of talent. 20 min males and 24 min females are common.