Official RunningLane National Championships thread

I have always preferred Footlocker. However, some of the top individuals skip it in favor of NXN. The cancelation will probably push even more people back to FL which will cause Runninglane to be a team championship and FL an individual one.

I think the best individuals would be wise to choose RunningLane, The guys and gals on some of the best teams could likely win the individual titles, so why wouldn't the best individuals want to take advantage of racing them?

Because Footlocker has been around forever and they have a great broadcast of the meet. The regionals also will attract some great runners merely because of the logistics of driving 300 miles as opposed to flying 1000 miles. The national trip is then paid for.

Newberry is going to Runninglane which is the same day as FL west. FL will be missing 4 of the top 8 runners in the nation. It is certainly not the definitive individual championship. Also Runninglane court is fast AF, individuals will come because they can run Pr's.

XC Nats wrote:

As we all know NXN is done. What I find cool about RXC is that we no longer have to speculate about the best teams vs best individuals. The races will be seeded according to performance metrics like the Milesplit 50....

Where I stopped. Milesplit is trash. Created by a spanish major, charges money for incomplete results and contains programmatic errors up and down the website. At no point should there be a paywall until they demonstrate completeness and professional level interfaces.

If RunningLane relies on Milesplit to seed their meet their plan to be the best national meet is neglectfully dissolved from the beginning.

DISCLAIMER: I support RunningLane as this year's de facto HS championships. One is needed. Athletes who participated last year agree that this is a worthy course for this type of race. If we are selected, our team will particpate. And maybe if the product is great, we will support it in future years.

There seems to be an aggressive marketing push for RunningLane that is rubbing me the wrong way. It appears that some connected people have been asked by or contracted by RunningLane to spread a message without disclosing this affiliaiton. First off, statements like "Nike is done." and "This is a better course" and "This is the new national championship" and "This is better because you don't have to mess with qualifying" and "This is better because we use metrics like the MS 50" are all misleading or straight up opinion and not fact.

MS has been pushing "rankings" that aren't rankings for years to the detriment of the sport. Simply listing 5k times and calling them rankings is not objective by the very nature of cross country courses. Long courses, hilly courses, any course at altitude, races run in extreme heat are all diminished. I have seen with my very own eyes how over the past decade, the push to run "fast" (or short) courses has gotten stronger to the point where contending teams need to strongly consider avoiding hilly courses and load their schedules up with short or flat ones just to appease the parents and athletes who mistakenly believe that in all circumstances, the faster the time, the better the performance.

A hs kid in the milesplit comment section had the @ for running lane's instagram in his bio, they seem to have their ambassadors

Exactly. Please reply with which state you are from.

The beautiful thing about RunningLane is that everyone can race, although you might not be in the fastest race. But if you are the 30th team in the country does it really matter if you are in the same race as Newberry? I think last year if I'm not mistaken RunningLane had 2 boys races, with the winner in the slower race still running sub 16. This venue is amazing and everyone can go get the "national meet" experience (maybe not the Nike billion dollar company experience) even in the "slower" race.

"Silver boys 2020 RunningLane"

1 Ellis, Kaleb 11 Tiger Town X 15:55.01 1

2 Harden, Matthew 10 Unattached 16:09.47

3 Arnold, Jake 12 Mustang Runn 16:11.27 2

4 Trosdal, Christian 12 Sovereign Gr 16:12.89 3

5 Childress, Grayson 11 Southern Dis 16:14.98 4

6 Joseph, Elijah 10 Unattached 16:15.38

7 Harris, Trace 10 Unattached 16:19.31

8 Randall, Robert 11 Mustang Runn 16:20.56 5

9 Johnson, William 10 Raptors XC 16:21.10 6

10 Ford, Brady 11 Unattached 16:23.02

11 Allen, Tucker 11 Unattached 16:23.41

12 Arnold, Sam 11 Southern Dis 16:26.12 7

13 Abramson, Thomas 12 Raptors XC 16:26.17 8

14 Maron, Michael 12 Unattached 16:28.91

15 Distler, Caleb 12 Unattached 16:30.91

16 Adkison, Troy 11 Cullman Ladies TC 16:32.57 9

Saladbar who? wrote:

This venue is amazing and everyone can go get the "national meet" experience (maybe not the Nike billion dollar company experience) even in the "slower" race.

What are you on?

Have you been to Huntsville? Have you spoken to any of the kids who ran RunningLane last year? I'll hang up and listen.

My son ran Footlocker Nationals in San Diego in 2019. Last year he was a 1st team All American at Runninglane. I can tell you that the Runninglane event was not even comparable to Footlocker nationals. He was definitely thankful for the opportunity to race top individuals from around the country with all the cancellations but if Footlocker was still happening it would be a no-brainer Footlocker all the way for individual runners. There's just too much history and a once in a lifetime experience. Plus after having been through the whole recruiting process I can tell you that being a Footlocker national qualifier carries a lot weight in college coaches eyes. That being said if it's a team that lost their opportunity for NXN then definitely Runninglane all the way but if you're a national class individual with no team try to qualify to Footlocker and get to run where the legends did in the past.

Lots of wishful thinking by the "Nike is done!" crowd. It's good that Runninglane is putting on an event and even calling it a national championship. I predict that NXN will be back in 2022 and Runninglane will be but a memory. They simply don't have the financial and marketing firepower to dethrone Nike (or New Balance/Footlocker for that matter). With NXN and Footlocker you get:

- a once-in-a-lifetime experience

- free air travel, hotel, meals, and VIP treatment

- the opportunity to hang out with Olympians and other current elite athletes

- a boatload of swag

- touring the Nike World Headquarters campus in Beaverton (NXN) / racing in sunny San Diego and staying at the Hotel Del Coronado (FL)

Huntsville, AL in December? (Meh.) Maybe go to the rocket museum? (Yawn.) Runninglane springs for some has been former elite to give a keynote address at the awards dinner? (Uh...who's this old fat guy?) Again, hats off to the folks in Alabama for hosting a race this fall but the kids all know about the NXN/FL experience and that is what drives them.

I appreciate what Running Lane is doing last year and this year with the cancelations that have happened. That being said, they need to stop pushing the "True" National Championship agenda. If it doesn't have regional qualifiers and not all of the best teams can afford to get there, then it is not a "True" National Championship. It is just a replacement National meet where many good teams and individuals will go, but I would be surprised if they got more than 12 of the top 30 teams in the Nation without paying for travel expenses.

dpb333 wrote:

I appreciate what Running Lane is doing last year and this year with the cancelations that have happened. That being said, they need to stop pushing the "True" National Championship agenda. If it doesn't have regional qualifiers and not all of the best teams can afford to get there, then it is not a "True" National Championship. It is just a replacement National meet where many good teams and individuals will go, but I would be surprised if they got more than 12 of the top 30 teams in the Nation without paying for travel expenses.

If the top teams go then it's a National Championship. It's that simple.

Natty is Batty wrote:

dpb333 wrote:

I appreciate what Running Lane is doing last year and this year with the cancelations that have happened. That being said, they need to stop pushing the "True" National Championship agenda. If it doesn't have regional qualifiers and not all of the best teams can afford to get there, then it is not a "True" National Championship. It is just a replacement National meet where many good teams and individuals will go, but I would be surprised if they got more than 12 of the top 30 teams in the Nation without paying for travel expenses.

If the top teams go then it's a National Championship. It's that simple.

Pretty much this^^. If anybody but Newbury Park wants to claim to being the best, they better book their trip to Running Lane and do it on the course head to head

Seems like the runninglane ambassadors/organizers or running rampant on this thread. Sheesh.

They changed the date after many schools had already purchased plane tickets etc. so they could snag NP and VC. They’ll have a flashy 2021 due to NP and VC but they burned bridges/lost trust and people aren’t going to go back when NXN comes rolling around again.

I will be curious to see how many of the top 25 teams they end up getting. It looks like there are 2 very solid top 5 teams (looking at their instagram) and will be curious to see how many others follow. As a side story, it will also be interesting to see if some top FL finalist talent flock to race the top teams in the country. Either way I think what they are attempting is pretty cool. Will it work out? Who knows but kudos for trying.

XC Nats wrote:

As we all know NXN is done. What I find cool about RXC is that we no longer have to speculate about the best teams vs best individuals. The races will be seeded according to performance metrics like the Milesplit 50, and we could see the top talent that would ordinarily do FL (and may still do FL) race against the best teams like Newbury Park for a true team/ individual hybrid national championship.

Drop your predictions. I think NP Boys are just about untouchable. The girls race should be very interesting though and I think is more of a toss up.

When did NBP announce they were going to RunningLane?