UW Areson 15:39/Kosinski 15:44 - 9 under 16:10

illegal track

The BroJo Kool-Aid drinker has spoken.

.wordsmith. wrote:

illegal track

Do these marks still count for indoor NCAA qualifying?

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Do these marks still count for indoor NCAA qualifying?

yes, that is why many schools send their athletes here again in march as their is a last chance qualifier meet.

douglas burke wrote:

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Do these marks still count for indoor NCAA qualifying?

yes, that is why many schools send their athletes here again in march as their is a last chance qualifier meet.

So, people can shut-up about the illegal track thing since it is bullshit.

.wordsmith. wrote: illegal track

No, the track is fine. You're just slower than you wish you were.

Dempsey Indoor has emerged as a popular indoor stop for top-tier distance runners, says Washington coach Greg Metcalf.

"The track is fast," said Metcalf. "Of the top 20 indoor marks in country at 800 meters and above last year {2009}, the majority of them came from Dempsey."

Last year, Dempsey was the site of the fastest 5,000 meters ever run by a college woman, indoor or outdoor, when Jenny Barringer of Colorado clocked 15:01.7.

Tom Lewis, communications manager of the U.S. Track and Field Coaches Association, says in 2009 Dempsey Indoor accounted for five of the six top indoor times in the men's 3,000 meters and 13 of the top 20 marks in the men's 5,000.

The track is great - BUT - there should be a little indexing factor added to it before equating it for purposes of qualifying for the NCAA championships.

Why? How about the fact that on an oversized track the athlete runs approximately 200 meters of straightaway per lap, so for a mile that's 1000 meters of straightaway versus 600 meters of curve running. Whereas on a 200 meter track the athlete runs approximately 70 meters of straightaway per lap, so for a mile that 560 meters of straightaway versus 1040 meters of curve running.

Add on the factor that not only is there over twice as much curve running on the 200 meter track, the actual curve is tighter than the wider curve on the bigger track.

That said, I don't think the adjustment should be extreme by any means. I suggest .2 per missing curve - so that would be

.2 for a 400, .6 for an 800, 1.2 for a mile, 2.0 for 3k, and 3.4 for 5k.

in support of fairness wrote:

How about the fact that on an oversized track the athlete runs approximately 200 meters of straightaway per lap, so for a mile that's 1000 meters of straightaway versus 600 meters of curve running. Whereas on a 200 meter track the athlete runs approximately 70 meters of straightaway per lap, so for a mile that 560 meters of straightaway versus 1040 meters of curve running.

Not necessarily, though you might be right for the UW track in particular. The ratio of curve-length to straightaway length depends on the shape of the track... not on its size.

I think a lot of the UW pattern has to do with the fields that go to UW looking for qualifiers (intending to set an NCAA qualifying pace), as well as the track.

A lot of data shows that shorter & faster races are more affected by turns than long races (the IAAF doesn't even run the 200 indoors anymore, and no one ever wins the 200 out of lane 1 in outdoor races), yet it has been the 3000 and 5000 where UW results really stand out.

Awesome races by Areson, Kosinski and the whole field! Does anyone know if this Knight is the sister of Katie Knight, who ran so well for North Central at NXN?

You can get 300m straight and 5m curve if you make it a triangle with curves 1-2m each; that definitely will not be fast. The size dictates the curve, straight factors. You would probably be better with long gradual bends between curves that do not need as much curving but such a track is not allowed (the new rule restricts the radius of curvature to 50m or something like that).

The track is not illegal, it is oversized. It cannot be used for records for indoor marks and in most circumstances (not PV, etc.) cannot be used for overall WRs either. That does not make the track illegal and it is interesting how such a non-subtle point seems to be way too subtle for some posters. Basically, anyone who has 'its illegal' is posting as an idiot and I essentially ignore their post - it that cannot get that right why should I bother trusting anything else that they right.

I see no reason why the UW track should be instigated against, just because other tracks don't meet the same standard of quality.

That's like saying Wejo's 10k shouldn't count, because Joey Smith only ran 3 miles a week.

So what.

If the other schools don't like it then they are welcome to built better tracks at their own facilities.

Are there specific guidelines for sizes of indoor tracks? Because I've seen lots of varying sizes, whereas outdoor is just 400m/440y or whatever.

If there aren't any guidelines, then who the eff cares what size the track is? Sure it's a small advantage but it's not like they're running on a downhill track.

Certainly worth watching the replay of this one (Flotrack).

J.R. wrote:

I see no reason why the UW track should be instigated against, just because other tracks don't meet the same standard of quality.

That's like saying Wejo's 10k shouldn't count, because Joey Smith only ran 3 miles a week.

So what.

If the other schools don't like it then they are welcome to built better tracks at their own facilities.

Except that the standard track indoors is now 200m (see above post regarding records). The more there are 300m tracks indoors, the more convoluted it will all become. There is a 400m indoor track in Canada (Ottawa) which, following your logic, all tracks must now replicate if faster (than 160y - 11 laps to the mile; or 200m) performances are the be-all and end-all. These are the tracks (160y) that could fit inside arenas (MSG, etc.), which is perhaps why there are so few of these meets even around anymore. The problem now is that (like Stanford outdoors) again it means athletes have to travel to these meets in order to qualify for something like NCAA's. Look at the men's DMR's from ND a couple of years ago - basically you had to be in that meet in order to qualify for NCAA's (I know it was more of a border issue that the length of the track).