National Championship Coach Fired - Arcadia Coach Jim O'Brien Fired From Track Team

Division 5 schools are smaller and have less students to choose from.

Yes, obviously.. but that's not the point of what everybody is trying to say. People are arguing that Flintridge Prep should not be in the same category as the other schools like Arcadia because they're no where near as good (regardless of how many students attend the school)

Ah the dysfunction of California HS track. As far as I can tell Chris has done a respectably fine job, albeit against minimal odds. Running against Arcadia is like fighting the Zulus. Numbers matter. It probably helps quite a bit that the school is enormous 2-3x the size of a typical California school, diverse and also has tons of money.

Ego problems on the coaching staff? Why would we be surprised? Many head coaches fancy themselves distance coaches and clearly the success of the distance program was bound to lead to some friction because folks will scramble to take credit. Basically Arcadia HS has morphed into a small college program with small college problems and specialty in distance running. All of this is easily predictable given the locale and demographics.

Yes the nationals championship thing is bogus but who really cares? Nike will keep hyping that silly NXN race and some giant school, probably from SoCal will routinely be in line to win it. And the distance coach who really produces the results there will swim upstream against some very hard heads.

dsrunner wrote:

Nike will keep hyping that silly NXN race and some giant school, probably from SoCal will routinely be in line to win it.

Silly? Seems as thought high schools throughout the country want to win that "silly" race.

Besides Arcadia, Royal (runner-up in '06) is the only other CA school to finish in the top 3. I wouldn't plan on any CA dominance, other than Arcadia's nice run.

Arcadia has about 3800 students. Although that is a lot, it is not 2-3 times as many as the typical California school. There are plenty of schools bigger than Arcadia (many more that have less). Regardless of the school size, however, their xc program has still done well (clearly) and as was just mentioned, SoCal schools do not routinely dominate at nxn. Since 2004, the first even nxn meet, how many California teams (not just SoCal) have won the championship? Not many. I can't say for sure about the girls (I think Manlius has won every year) but i think only Arcadia has won, showing the California, although still very good, does not dominate at nxn.

The high school I went to had 900 students. There were barely enough kids out for a cross country team.

The great thing about Footlocker is that any young person can qualify based on their personal performance, not the size of the school.

J.R. wrote:

The high school I went to had 900 students. There were barely enough kids out for a cross country team.

The great thing about Footlocker is that any young person can qualify based on their personal performance, not the size of the school.

The great thing about NXN is that any young person can qualify based on their personal performance....

Brisk Pacing wrote:

The great thing about NXN is that any young person can qualify based on their personal performance....

Oh, when did they change it?

J.R. wrote:

Oh, when did they change it?

They changed it in 2004 (I think?) the same time that they changed their name from Nike Team Nationals to Nike Cross Nationals to accommodate individual runners.

Regardless what they call it, their qualifying is still by teams, and therefore the size of the schools, not by individuals.

Thank goodness for Footlocker Nationals.

You've previously made your hate for Nike and NXN obvious, but you're certainly aware that individuals can qualify for NXN (regardless of the size of their school).

School size (or more importantly, urban/suburban location) certainly plays a role in the programs that qualify for NXN as a team, but that doesn't diminish the accomplishment.

rocky mountains wrote:

You've previously made your hate for Nike and NXN obvious, but you're certainly aware that individuals can qualify for NXN (regardless of the size of their school).

You need to get off the coffee, or drugs.

J.R. ...... are you not reading what people, including myself are saying? Not only are there team qualifications to NXN, there are also INDIVIDUAL ones as well. This means, to be completely OBVIOUS, that INDIVIDUALS can QUALIFY for NXN

Not that Coach O'Brien is not an amazing coach, cause he clearly is, but the claim that Arcadia holds the longest active streak for qualifying for D1 CIF States is false. Maybe from the SS, but Bill Gregg has sent teams from Davis for over ten straight years now.

I am glad to hear that Jim will still be coaching xc in the fall. It is sad when politics and egos get in the way of helping the kids, which is the point isn't it?

(http://www.brooksrunning.com/Jim-O%27Brien/jimOBrien,default,pg.html)

Lol, I might have run against him...Actually he's probably several years older...anyone know his age? I went to a hs in the same area he did.

Where is he coaching in the fall?

howbout you get real wrote:

Nutter, do you really think it is about the stipend?

Granted high school coaches in California make more, but you are an absolute idiot if you think people put in the time and effort for the small stipend. With all the work put in, it is barely minimum wage.

nutterforme wrote:

.

Nope I am not an idiot. I volunteer coached for free at highschool. The coach loved the group, but enjoyed the money. He did a nice job. The next year the assistant football coach came in. They paid him, and asked me to come back of course because he had little interest and less knowledge.

They have the money and they like to spread it around to the people they favor. You see it all the time. The wrestling coach who coaches soccer. The basketball coach who coaches lacrosse. Etc.

The ADs sometimes use the money to manipulate other levels of support. Its there, they use it. Caoching is only hard if you don't know what you are doing.

Plus numbnuts, $3000 to $5000 for a season, when apart from the occasional meet, you're still home earlier than an average businessman, is not chump change. Its spending money for the 12 week break in summer.

Footlocker is 100 percent the best individuals from each region, who represent their regions in a similar fashion to the best runners representing their countries at world cross country.

That is very simply not what happens at Nx.

I am not connected with either of the meets. I just like seeing the best kids in the country get a chance to run in the Footlocker Nationals.

For a whole bunch of people who know nothing about either person you guys are sure quick to jump to conclusions. I have ran under every running coach Arcadia has to offer, and there is no end to the corruption on all their parts. It is not fair to put everything on one or the other, or only to advocate for Coach O'Brien. Though Coach O'Brien is clearly an excpetional coach, I can tell you now it is because he recruits only the most excpetional people. He focuses primarily on his varisty team, and if you aren't running in the 14/15 range, you aren't worth his time. When it comes to the track coach, true, not all of us run in all the invitationals, but only varsity runs in half of the xc races O'Brien takes his boys too. O'Brien epitomizes cocky, he's funny yes, but he takes ALL of the credit for the hardwork his athletes put in and he never let's you forget it is him and not you that is successful. The issues go so much further than any of you are looking at. Coach O'brien is just as much at fault as any of the other coaches, they all have issues with eachother, and all for different, but justifiable reasons, I assure you.

nutterforme wrote:

Plus numbnuts, $3000 to $5000 for a season, when apart from the occasional meet, you're still home earlier than an average businessman, is not chump change. Its spending money for the 12 week break in summer.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAahahahhahaha

3-5 k a season......

hahahahahahahahah

nice joke

I coach XC, Indoor, and Outdoor and make 1800 for ALL THREE TOGETHER...as the HEAD coach. God my assistant makes 800 for all three.

Oh and we hold practice every day Monday-Saturday during the summer. We are a top five team in the state year in and year out because of all the hard work. but the pay is crap.

That's most schools around the country not 3-5k.

Its 6 weeks not 12 weeks off in the summer by the way.

wtf don't the Arcadia kids race xc like every weekend? I see them all the time not just varsity