what kind of 5k time do you think makes a college guy "average"

D1: 15:20

D3: 15:45

D1, 2, 3?

Big conference, small conference?

Describe the average college and I'll describe the average college 5k runner...

15:00. Division shouldn't matter...college is college, and average is average.

I'd say 14:30-14:40. A 14:30 guy won't score at any (decent) conference meets, but it's not a bad time.

Qualifier: this is for D1

I was D2 in the 80's, ran 15:22 - that was well below average.

yep, i'm average wrote:

I say somewhere between 15:00-15:30. You're certainly not bad, but you're not really good either.

Jamaican HS Champs 5000m winner 2011 was 15:25.

where i ran D3 at i would say slower, average 5k dude was around 16:00

16 seems about right for D3

D1, 2, 3?

Big conference, small conference?

Describe the average college and I'll describe the average college 5k runner...[/quote]

across all divisions. can a 15:10 guy make a legitimate claim to being average? i realize in D1 this doesn't mean much, but in D2 you'd probably be in the top 5 on your cross team, and i bet in D3 or NAIA you could have been one of the top guys at many schools.

I think some people don't really understand the concept of average... There are so many schools that don't have a single good athlete, that the average is probably somewhere closer to 17 minutes. Seriously. Look around at results.

Honestly, I'm a ~15:15 guy (or was in college), and placed in well over the top 50% of the races I ran. Yeah, I would get stomped at bigger meets, but most meets are smaller meets. Take a look at NY, even D1 - Hofstra, Fordham, Canisius, Buffalo, Wagner, Stony Brook, Niagra, Manhattan College, Albany, Binghampton, etc. They aren't exactly swimming in talent. And this is D1. You have D2, D3, NAIA, Community Colleges, whatevs.

Average D1 wrote:

I'd say 14:30-14:40. A 14:30 guy won't score at any (decent) conference meets, but it's not a bad time.

Qualifier: this is for D1

I was a 14:30s 5k guy and while I never scored in the 5k, I medaled in the 10k in a pretty good conference.

I still thin 14:30s is better than Average. I mean, I am 32 and still win every local race I run and all I do is run 7 miles a day at 6:30 pace.

take the average runner from every team in the nation, D1 D2 and D3, and average their times together and you will have the average time.

or you could just take a list of all 5k times run across all division and pick the median.

I'd say 15:50 puts you right around average in D3, 15:10 for D1, D2 is somewhere in between.

I was going to say the median would be way faster than the average, but nobody really runs much slower than 17 flat ever, at least not that I've seen.

logic wrote:

take the average runner from every team in the nation, D1 D2 and D3, and average their times together and you will have the average time.

or you could just take a list of all 5k times run across all division and pick the median.

thatd be pretty tits if someone has enough time to do this. Pretty time consuming, and you'd have to throw out any outliers (if any)

what's the point of this thread?

MEAC - 10th best 5000 - 15:59

SWAC - 10th best 5000 at Conference - 16:31

A-10 - 10th best 5000 at Conference - 15:29

MAAC - 10th best 5000 at Conference - 16:32

Southern - 10th best 5000 at Conference (2008) - 15:29

Big South - 10th best 500 at Conference - 15:41

***21st in the Big South was 18:09.... on the track.

15:30 for an AVERAGE might be a bit fast. I know the above is just a quick sample from some of the smaller DI conferences but from looking at the results, 16:00-16:15 might be little more accurate for DI. There are a lot of schools that have really poor distance programs.

I immediately thought 15 mins.

14:10