ALL INCOMING COLLEGE FRESHMAN RUNNERS...

I AM SO JACKED!

My high school team was pretty lame. I was our #1 since junior year and always anchored our 4x8 but we'd have all the dual meets against public schools with no good runners. At State I'd get some competition but it was cool. Soon it will be like State every week.

I think the girls team will be much better looking than high school. It's hard to tell from the roster pics and the freshman aren't listed yet. Probs though.

2/10

Lol. If this is what you are looking forward to in college you are a total bore and will really have no fun at all.

there is more you know wrote:

Lol. If this is what you are looking forward to in college you are a total bore and will really have no fun at all.

why are there always negative people like this who love to try to kill other people's excitement?

Are you so miserable that you can't stand other people being hopeful and happy?

dont expect it to be some kind of cake walk. if you actually want to accomplish something you will need to work hard. things wont just come to you.

its a great experience and you should be excited but get ready for a full time job. its not always pretty but the more you put in the more you get out.

good luck, run hard, stay positive and it will be a great experience

Biggest thing (for a lot of guys): the pressure is off.

Doesn't matter how big a stud you were in HS, if you're on a decent college team you're not going to be expected to be a big contributor as a frosh. Just keep your mouth shut, pay attention, *don't* try to "win" the practices, and go with the flow.

A lot of frosh, now that they're not at home, have a tendency to "kick over the traces" and do stuff they wouldn't have done with Mom and Dad around. You can probably adjust to college quickest just by making up your mind that you'll go to be "today" (i.e. before midnight) every day--that by itself will smooth the path.

Sure, the OP was probably a troll post. So what?

My college Men's Cross Country team is the only Varsity team on campus that does not receive scholarships (wonderful) so that means two things. One, the team itself is pretty weak and the intra-team competition really is not that strong. However, two is that the team is very small, only like 12 runners or so. Now, I never ran well enough in High School to garner the attention of any team, and not quite well enough to walk onto the team this year. But I know for a fact that I am capable of running a 27:30 8k which is roughly what a top 5 runner on the team runs. I just have to get there by sophomore year next year.

Now, there is no Men's track team, but they still compete in invitationals under the school's name, the runners just don't compete in Conference, Regional or National Competitions. Since this structure is more of a club kind of dynamic, I think it would be a little easier to train with them in the spring but I have not spoken with the coach about THAT yet.

It's interesting to note that the Women's Cross Country and Track teams have scholarships AND are both National D1 caliber teams.

My advice to any and all in coming Freshmen.

1. Dont go all "High School Harry" and talk about races you won, times you ran, etc. They dont mean $hit any more. Just wipe the slate clean and start over. Your team mates will learn how fast you are in due time.

2. Do NOT keep your HS bf/gf. DO NOT DO THIS!!

3. Dont assume your team mates are "runners". Sure they are getting scholarship money, but there are a lot of them going through the motions and they are very negative. Avoid their negativity at all costs!

4. Buy into the training. Resist the urge to only do what you did in HS.

5. School is going to be hard. If you just walked through HS (like I did) this will be a rude lesson. School is the #1 priority, you will not be a pro runner, but you will be a pro something else post graduation.

6. Go to parties and have some fun, meet more people than XC team mates. If all you do is run and study you're missing out. (Balance grasshopper..balance..)

7. Run like hell. This is your chance to run as fast as you probably ever will run. You have a coach, support, time, and training /rehab resources. You also get to race against runners that will go on to be great. See where you match up.

One of the great things about our sport is that if you go to a big meet you can race a national champion, even if you go to Podunk U.

go vandy go!

How was this negative? Why are you being negative about my post?

negativity wrote:

there is more you know wrote:

Lol. If this is what you are looking forward to in college you are a total bore and will really have no fun at all.

why are there always negative people like this who love to try to kill other people's excitement?

Are you so miserable that you can't stand other people being hopeful and happy?

"making up your mind that you'll go to bed "today" (i.e. before midnight)"

Don't want a typo to get in the way of such good advice.

Nope. Vandi completed in SEC and NCAA South Cross Country meets. No track team though.

how can you be haxoring and getting good grades if you go to bed before midnight, sleeping is giving in.

another advantage to college is that there are hot, naked sloots all over the place

Without question the following post is the best (maybe only good one) on an otherwise pretty lame thread. Good luck kiddos. Follow this guy's advice and you should do well. Both school and running will be work but done well and it's worth it.

Join a frat

Party hard

Drop out

Make me a cheeseburger.

Yeah... all that! I was surprised at the $hitty attitude so many of the athletes had about the sport, the coach, etc. when I got to college.

Don't try to prove yourself during preseason camp. There will be plenty of races to prove yourself and your just going to piss the upperclassmen off if your pushing workouts or even more worse, easy runs.

My college coach was an idiot. My high school coach knew more and was more of an expert. In college we were successful because he was a good recruiter. Don't expect you coach to do more than throw a bunch of intervals at you. In college it is work hard to success or injury.

The rest of what you said, and said here is true.