I don't see the point of the Championship meets if all they try to do is go for the win?

RunningTimes wrote:

I was watching the college indoor championship meet and they are not running their best times, but are just trying to stick with the pack and out kick at the end. I don't see the purpose or point behind it? Just try to run your PR and wherever you place is where you place. If there is any winner/champion in this, it would be the person who had the fastest time that season in that distance event, doesn't matter the meet. Seems like a waste of time and nothing is being accomplished if you are just trying to beat the other person next to you. It is a shame they turn it into that and they run so much slower, it looks stupid. It's about running the best time you can, not trying to out run other people. Hopefully they realize it someday that it doesn't matter how fast you are in comparison to other people.

bumblebee wrote:

RunningTimes wrote:

I was watching the college indoor championship meet and they are not running their best times, but are just trying to stick with the pack and out kick at the end. I don't see the purpose or point behind it? Just try to run your PR and wherever you place is where you place. If there is any winner/champion in this, it would be the person who had the fastest time that season in that distance event, doesn't matter the meet. Seems like a waste of time and nothing is being accomplished if you are just trying to beat the other person next to you. It is a shame they turn it into that and they run so much slower, it looks stupid. It's about running the best time you can, not trying to out run other people. Hopefully they realize it someday that it doesn't matter how fast you are in comparison to other people.

0/10. Poor effort

[stay in your lane wrote:

Agreed! Oddly 800m+ footraces devolve to such "tactical" races because runners do not get their own exclusive lanes. Thankfully the pure speed events 100m-400m are conducted as proper tests of speed. Seems like the discrepancy must just be due to tradition since a proper stagger could be defined for any footrace including long events such as the 10-kilometer (lane 8 would run somewhere around 22 laps instead of 25 for lane 1). Such an approach is more consistent with other racing forms such as swimming, kayaking and long track speed-skating. With speed-skating the competitors occasionally share a straightaway where they switch lanes which is an excellent idea as well so that the inside lane competitors are not disadvantaged by the tighter turns.

Of course some folks enjoy the tactics, and so possibly speed-skating has already found the optimal solution: There could be "long track" running format with lanes/stagger only using the current 400m tracks, and a "short track" tactical race format (perhaps using a 100m circular track circumscribed within the typical 400m track) so that we can have the best of both worlds!

[stay in your lane wrote:

Agreed! Oddly 800m+ footraces devolve to such "tactical" races because runners do not get their own exclusive lanes. Thankfully the pure speed events 100m-400m are conducted as proper tests of speed. Seems like the discrepancy must just be due to tradition since a proper stagger could be defined for any footrace including long events such as the 10-kilometer (lane 8 would run somewhere around 22 laps instead of 25 for lane 1). Such an approach is more consistent with other racing forms such as swimming, kayaking and long track speed-skating. With speed-skating the competitors occasionally share a straightaway where they switch lanes which is an excellent idea as well so that the inside lane competitors are not disadvantaged by the tighter turns.

Of course some folks enjoy the tactics, and so possibly speed-skating has already found the optimal solution: There could be "long track" running format with lanes/stagger only using the current 400m tracks, and a "short track" tactical race format (perhaps using a 100m circular track circumscribed within the typical 400m track) so that we can have the best of both worlds!