Big 10 XC predictions

Too the Big Ten network can't be bothered to broadcast the meet live. I will look forward to the 30 minute high light show in December. FYI Race is Sunday not Saturday.

QUESTION #5: Coach, year in and year out, Wisconsin is always the hunted team in this meet, because of how many titles they’ve won. This year, are the guys able to have a chip on their shoulder because Indiana beat you in the adidas meet?

BYRNE: “I would say so. I think that, again, it was a bit of a surprise. We knew that Indiana was coming into town for the adidas meet. And we knew that they were in good shape. And they ran really well and we weren’t quite up to the challenge then. But I think for our guys knew that they just were a little bit off. I mean, Mohammed has three weeks of training under his belt. We pulled Maverick Darling off the line two minutes before the gun went off. So we were shortchanged going into that meet.

I don’t want to say that you’re going to discard any other team from it, but it certainly looks like it’s going to be a battle between Indiana and Wisconsin. And we’re up for that challenge.”

Im picking Wisconsin for the win.

I am prediciting Ahmed for the win easily and #5 man for Wisconsin no worse than 8th. Team wins easily over IU, but IU gets 2nd easily. Huge gap after top 2 teams.

I do not think that Connor will beat all but three other guys in the league. He is getting better but was 18th at addidas; he was significantly better at Oregon but the top 3-4 Indiana guys ran the end of the 8km at addidas very well.

look ar resuklts wrote:

I am prediciting Ahmed for the win easily and #5 man for Wisconsin no worse than 8th. Team wins easily over IU, but IU gets 2nd easily. Huge gap after top 2 teams.

Connor is 6th man.

Race Time Forecast: 44, 0% chance rain, 7 mph wind.

Best Quote i heard was Robert Gary saying Indiana is good on paper! Awesome coach you nailed it!

the thing is IU has nothing to lose. Wisconsin is the team with all the pressure. if IU beats them, Wisco's reign is over with.

i don't know why people are all over ahmed. poore destroyed wisco in both the steeple and 5K outdoors at big 10s, those guys couldn't even hang on for that long. this thing isn't over until the 5th men hit the tape.

Big blow for Michigan State. #1 guy had an emergency appendectomy before Pre-Nats and won't be ready to go. They probably were the favorites for 3rd, but now it could be OSU, PSU, or maybe Minnesota.

If you look at the results you will see that the key guys like Ahmed won the 10,000 at Big Tens, and then was a very close 4th at the 10,000 behind only the stars.

badgers running scared wrote:

the thing is IU has nothing to lose. Wisconsin is the team with all the pressure. if IU beats them, Wisco's reign is over with.

i don't know why people are all over ahmed. poore destroyed wisco in both the steeple and 5K outdoors at big 10s, those guys couldn't even hang on for that long. this thing isn't over until the 5th men hit the tape.

Also if Reed Connor is 6th man, who is Fifth?

Brice has been hurt a bit, although he might run now (talked with his folks at the addidas meet). I think Reed is ahead of Shields and see him as the Sixth man. Thomas is also good backup, but not #5, and similarly with Brill.

Ahmed - will win Big Ten

Peacok - will be top 5

Krause - was 2nd at Big Ten's last year

Darling - will be top 10 if not top 5. Broke 14:00 for 5000.

Conner - will be top 10

Shields

Brice - was Wisco state champ 2yrs ago.

By class:

Ahmed - SOPH

Darling - SOPH

Connor - SOPH

Krause - JUN

Thomas - JUN

Peacock - SEN (one senior, the horror!)

Shields - FR

Brill - FR

Brice - FR

Berman - FR

Wisconsin's issue is depth. There is a huge gap between their 5th guy (Connor) and 6-8(Thomas, Brill, Shields).

For Indiana to win, they're going to have to either run as well as they can (very possible) or Wisconsin is going to have to have one of the top five have an off day (possible).

The interesting thing will be Wisconsin's strategy. It's hard to believe that they will want to get into a last 1K shoot-out with Indiana. Two years ago at Michigan, Peacock blew the race open with a hard surge at 3K, took a big lead and only Mead was able to run him down. I can see Peacock, Ahmed and Krause pushing it hard somewhere in the 4K-5K area with Darling and Connor holding back with the Indiana pack. If the Indiana guys can stay close enough and then have enough left to run them down and win the team title, congrats!

Reed Connor is probably the biggest question at this point because a little difference in pace has more consequences in terms of points, although if Conner is not too far back it is like a dual meet between Indiana and Wisconsin and it does not seem like the sixth man on either team will be ahead of the others fifth. This reduces the pressure on Connor. His performance at Oregon was very good, only a handful of seconds off of first and he was not running with a front group but keep a pace from further back.

The Badgers won't let it come down to some precious few points with the 5th man. Not with Ahmed winning and 2 more Badgers in the top 5. It will not be the run away that it was last year but they will have a comfortable 10-15 point win.

See you all out at University Ridge tomorrow bright and early.

Wisco by 7pts

bump

hahahahah

28 75; Minnesota would have beaten Bayer (Indiana) if Mead was racing.

a big pack still together at 15:15 at 5km. By 5.4km it was starting to break up some and by 6km Turner had fallen off the truck and was starting to go backwards. He ended up 29th, scoring one more point than Wisconsin all by himself. Wisconsin surged several times making Indiana respond in a bit of a crowded front group, then Blankenship hit the front and Ahmed realized he would need to put in a gap if he wanted to finish ahead of Ben. That started to rip things apart, and by 6 km Connor was well ahead of a couple Indiana guys and Turner looked terrible -- way beyond "he's not coming back".

Quite a battle up the finishing straight with Ahmed having a lead and then being passed by the first Indiana guy who then was passed by Peacock at the line and with Blankenship closing so fast that he would have won if it was 8k (~80m short) and would have won if it was maybe 10 meters longer. Ahmed was fourth and Elliot Krause fifth; top five in 2.2 seconds, then Darling in 6th and Connor

Times were slow through 5km and then things started to slowly explode at the front.

Really exciting race to watch. I had them at 2:55 at the kilometer, but Byrne's quoted saying 4:55 at the mile, so either some markers were wrong, or things got out reasonably quick and then really scaled back. It definitely was slow through 4k though (leaders 12:05 on my watch), and it was somewhere before that mark that Darling went to the lead to try to stretch things out a bit. Seemed to be a team oriented move, cause there's no way he thought he was going to win front running from the 3k mark, and it didn't look like he was trying to break away anyways, just keep things fast.

6k to finish was absolutely thrilling. I think there were at least 4 leaders, Blankenship, Ahmed, Bayer, and Peacock (who led for all of the last step) in that stretch, although it was tough to see for sure at all times...

I think that they were throwing is surges to put Indiana on the defensive and so they would have to try to move through he pack to get out and that took a lot out of them.The course low point is just before the 1km mark and then climbs 90 feet and drops a steep little chunck before 2km, so the second km is slow (at addidas they were 2:48/6:00, today they hit 2 km well above 6, maybe 6:12 even). The last kilo is short by about 80m and was fast as well. Adam Green might get the award as biggest blowup; he was in th elead pack at 5Km and finished after Wisconsin's 8th man in 50th in 24:55, losing 75 seconds to the top 5.