Which Ivy League school has the best training environment?

(1) Princeton. Good trails, good training, south enough where the winters aren't brutal

last place: Dartmouth. Too cold, too hilly. The combo of cold and hilly is what ruined Tom Mccardle's achilles

look at which college wins the HYP meet each year, and it's also the best in America

What do you mean best in America?

Some years ago Dartmouth had the #1 ranked XC team in the country

oh cool how long ago was that

Duke has some good dirt roads and trails nearby, like the American Tobacco Trail.

Not an Ivy

Duke is the Harvard of the South. /s

I just watched a clip of a comedian who said an audience member came up to here after his show and said Florida was the Harvard of the South. Amazing how delusional some people are ...

Unbiased rating

1. Princeton

2. Cornell

3. Dartmouth

4. Harvard

5. Penn, Yale, Brown, Columbia

I’ve heard Duke described as the College of New Jersey at Durham.

I would switch Cornell and Princeton, but Cornell Princeton and Dartmouth are the runaway top three with there variety of amazing soft surface trails and nice road routes for the winter.

Duke is the best in the south, but it’s a tier below HYPSM

Rice has to be the worst, in the middle of urban Houston.

Not an Ivy, nerd.

I'd imagine Princeton is pretty nice. I only have experience from running around on short warm-ups and cool downs around the campus area (usually during a track meet etc).

Obviously I'm biased with Cornell but I spent 5 years there on the trails. We have a lot of hills and single track out in the Ithaca area. I thought it was great! Sure, the winters are a bit cold and there is snow/ice, but honestly I had a harder time running in Michigan winters.

For the winter we did a lot of runs around campus, on certain paved country roads and even in the plantations area (there was also an old dirt horse track, the golf course, sapsucker woods etc). Our indoor track facility was also used quite a bit!

Summer was awesome on the trails and we'd venture over towards Ithaca college, the "burns trail" system and 2nd dam etc.

It was certainly pretty hilly and we ran a lot of 8-min miles, but you can't beat the woods, the rivers, the trees and the vast amount of space out in that area (as well as all the waterfalls and gorges).

I was considering Cornell but ultimately decided against it. Agree with you that it seems like a perfect place to train but that winter is rough.

However, I feel like running past the gorge would feel eerie due to the nets.

My son ran at Princeton. As a visitor and recreational runner, I loved running on the canal path by campus.

New Haven is ghetto. Yale should "Penntrify" like Penn did.

It's actually crazy how many good colleges are located in the hood. I assume it's since they're woke, they view gentrification as 'racist' and don't take into account how it benefits the city. Out of the T20, I'd say that 7 are located in ghetto areas. Here's my list, and they're not in any particular order.

1. Yale - New Haven is violent
2. UChicago - Hyde Park was the only safe place in the south side, but now crime is up even there. Surrounding areas are warzones.
3. WashU - St Louis, enough said
4. Hopkins - Homewood is safe, but the hospital is located in the hood
5. Penn - safe-ish, but since 2020 crime has spread. Crime in Philly is out of control
6. Vanderbilt - pretty safe area, but since 2020 crime has spread
7. Columbia - safe-ish, but it borders a few bad areas. Students have fallen victims to violent crime
8. Notre Dame - South Bend is violent