How good does the avg. Foot Locker Finalist become?

Most can expect to become a top five guy on their team. 14 minute 5k runner. At least that was the case with a guy on my team who was top ten at FL

Top 100 at ncaa cross country nationals or a regional qualifier in track. Only a couple kids each class do some of notice in college. College is a lot harder to place high when you factor in foreign runners late bloomers and fifth year seniors. Plus most of the footlocker kids are already tapping into their potential so their improvement rate in college is for less from someone who may have gotten 11-15 at regionals but only does 40 miles a week

although many don't become "name" runners like webb, rupp, hall, ritz... very few runners do, but that doesn't mean they weren't good in college. I'd be willing to bet that over 2/3 of the FL guys have great college careers, even if you don't recognize their names. Just look back through the lists of guys that broke 14 or became all american or something equivalent-a ton of them were FL qualifiers. Sure there has been flops, but thats just the nature of our sport & I think on the whole FL guys have done fairly well in college, even if they maybe didn't become the big time stand outs

Most get some sort of ride, so its a bonus.

e.g. Tim Broe was the first person in his family to go to Uni. Without running, he would not have gone (and wasn't particularly motivated to go in the first place).

He's probably better off because of it. As are most of these kids.

That's like saying how many HS fball all american's become NFL stars.

I'm sure most NFL stars were HS all americans, but not HS All American's are stars. The same would apply to FL.

Yeah, none of these guys ever amounted to anything...

Fasil Bizuneh

Tim Broe

Alan Culpepper

Bobby Curtis

Mark Davis

Ian Dobson

Joe Falcon

Ryan Hall

Adam Goucher

Jason Hartman

Brad Hudson

John Jefferson

Gabe Jennings

Bob Kennedy

Meb Keflezighi

Louis Luchini

Jason Lunn

Josh McDougal

Dan Middleman

Mike Mykytok

Louie Quintana

Jason Rexing

Johnathan Riley

Dathan Ritzenhein

Josh Rohatinsky

Galen Rupp

Don Sage

Darin Shearer

Steve Slattery

Chris Solinsky

Matt Tegenkamp

Ed Torres

Jorge Torres

Alan Webb

Todd Williams

I guess I should have read the OP better, the question was how good does the average Foot Locker Finalist become. Looking at the number of names on that list above, and comparing it to the total number, I would guess only maybe about five to ten percent go on to become national class. Considering you have to be able to run about 15:00 on grass at age 17-18 to make it, I would guess that as long as they stay injury free, most go on to run at least sub 14:30 on the track.

Also, I'm not being sexist, but just stating the obvious. I would bet a much larger percentage of the boys than girls FL Finalist go on to become top NCAA and later national class runners.

Who's Darin Shearer?

For guys, it means quite a bit to be a Footlocker finalist. Look forward to a successful college running career.

For the girls, it doesn't mean nearly as much. In particular, there are many cases of Fresh/Sophs that make it to Footlocker, then are unable to repeat. Sexual maturity can really screw up your running, if you're female.

Attrition: A gradual diminution in number or strength because of constant stress.

How many great HS runners go on to become great collegeians? Great post-collegians?

How many XC All-Americans go on to become great post-collegians? Olympians?

Not many in either case. Reason? Life. You improve in high school, running is fun, you race well. In college it becomes a "job". As a young adult you are pulled in many different places, academically, professionally, and socially. After college you lose that team atmosphere and that desire to hammer it day in and day out. I know low 14 college 5k guys who barely run 2 years after being out of school. That is life.

Alan

Looking at men's results only it is apparant that the early years weren't as strong as the last 10 years. Early on an average year had 4 footlocker finalists go on to become NCAA ALL-Americans while a good year had 9. Lately 8-10 most years do.

As far as NAME runners I'm assuming you are talking about Olympians only, or at least NCAA champs. Plenty of them on the men's side.

Looking at the era I competed, I recognize several names of guys who were NCAA D1 top finishers in track. Names like Gawain Guy, Greg Whitely, John Easker, Keith Hanson, Mark Coogan, Tom Ansberry, Scott Fry, Kevin King, Tim Hacker, John Scherer, Mark Smith, Jeff Atkinson, Bill Taylor, Gavin Gaynor, Joe Falcon, Scott Jenkins...

These are names that competed 1979-84. Today they might not me considered "name" runners, but if you ran in the mid 1980's you knew who they were because these were the guys in the top 4 at NCAA's or top 8 at US Nationals and OLympic Trials distance events. Out of that group I count 5 NCAA Champions and 2 Olympians (Coogan and Atkinson). Andd Doodlebug didn't even mention any of these except for Falcon.

Also add John Trautmann, NCAA and OLympic Trials 5000 Champion. I'd say he was a name runner.

I would say statistically that foot lockers guys have a better chance of becoming a solid college runner then someone who isnt. That is not saying that people that dont make it, cant or wont become good. I bet after the top 25 at the regional foot locker race there is a tremendous dropoff though. Nothing is a guarantee. Some kids are losers, go to the wrong programs for them, dont adapt, do not have the next level of work ethic, etc. Works both ways but there is a reason they are foot locker guys because they might possess better genetic capabilities.

There are a few familiar names on this list from 1998

http://footlockercc.com/history/1998girls.htm

but it's ten years later and you don't see too many Olympians or American Record Holders.

Whatever happened to two-time FL Champion Erin Sullivan from Vermont?

http://gostanford.cstv.com/sports/c-track/mtt/sullivan_erin00.html

Felicia Guliford is a perfect example.

She was three or four times a Foot Locker finalist, but look at all she accomplished in college.

http://www.directathletics.com/athletes/track/93184.html

However you define success in college the earlier poster was right, if you make FL you have a much better chance of being successful in college running then a runner who does not compete at that level in HS. However, there are a lot more people who do not make FL, so even if they have 1/100 the chance of being as successful there are far greater than 100 times the number of FL qualifiers who continue running so they dominate the FL qualifiers.

The other thing that comes into play is a perecptual bias with FL qualifers. People expect them to be successful in college even though the odds are agianst it (at least for them to be successful enough that we hear about it) becuase in general people don't take into account the tougher comp, odds of injury, etc etc. So our expectation is the odds for success are much greater than they really are. Then when they don't succeed (or we don't hear about it) we think the faliure rate is high. On the other hand, a guy like Brian Sell comes along, we see his success and don't realize the significant odds against him and think this is a much more normal occurence than it really is.

It would make a good psyche paper.

I'd like to know what happened to guys like: RYAN DEAK(lol), Brian Dalpiaz, Yong Sung-Leal, etc.

Deak flamed out, Dalpiaz did nothing at Georgetown, and Leal got married very young.