The Official D3 Track Thread

I think the best performer at nationals was Luke Campbell from Salisbury. He's just a sophomore and won both the 110 and 400 meter hurdles.

He won the 110 hurdles 13.82 seconds, the third-fastest time in D3 history. Second place was 14.14

He won the 400m hurdles by more than half a second in 50.36. It was the fourth-fastest time in D3 history.

Congrats Luke Campbell, ridiculously talented.

Would Ramos have taken down Horowitz?

You're absolutely right about Carius and Donnelly, great coaches who've built great programs. I don't think either of them is going anywhere though; although they're at or beyond retirement age, I've got a feeling those guys are going out with their boots on.

Rene the Cart wrote:

Three tightly-fought xc championships--admittedly sandwiched between two North Central xc acts of utter domination--a sub-14:00 5k and two more 5k's close to that barrier, a sub-29:00 10k, and more 1500, steeple, 5k, 10k and xc All-Americans than I care to count, all culminating in North Central's absurd team strength in the 10k this weekend (would that have been the best d3 xc team ever?) and a pair of scintillating battles between Stadler and Crain.

Yup, North Central dominated this past fall in XC...4 All Americans and 70 points ahead of La Crosse who was right below them in the standings. Oh shit! I just checked the results again...NCC didn't actually win the meet! Also, suggesting that because 3 guys went 1-3-5 in a mediocre 10K field (running times over 31:00 to do so) means that they might be "the best D3 XC team ever" is beyond absurd.

St. Olaf are the defending XC champions and yet people still consider them the underdogs, or don't even consider them at all. Of course it's not hard to see why -- the coach seems to really have problems with getting his athletes to compete in the distance events at nationals.

Grant Wintheiser was ranked 6th in the 5000 and I don't see why he shouldn't have doubled (he was 4th in the 1500). Perhaps he was sore and they were being cautious, but it's disappointing not to seem him or any other Ole in the 5/10

Stadler and Crain were both clocked at 14:11.01. That must have been a great race, wish I'd seen it. Any video of it? They streamed the indoors, but I missed it as I was traveling.

Well, based on their post-race interview, St. Olaf considers themselves the underdogs too:

I appreciate that Wintheiser didn't double. The other doublers who did the 1500/5000 were 13th in the 5000 and last place -- both over 15:00. It's not a double that goes particularly well very often.

Full reply is available here:

Men's 5000 starts at 4:10.

I don't really see how anybody can question the St. Olaf coaches. They just went 2-4-9 in one of the deeper 1500 fields ever assembled in d3. That was without one of their senior all-american milers who was injured most ofbthd year. They beat a ncc team in cross-country that a lot of people thought were unbeatable. And most people would describe their recruits as above average at best. You could do a lot worse than ruuning for one coach who is a big ten coy and another who is in the minnesota t and f hall of fame.

Thanks for the video link. I would have thought Crain would have started his drive at least 800 to go, as he's admitted to not being the strongest kicker. Considering he ran 14:06 at the indoor championship, it was disappointing not to see him try to break 14, but I guess he peaked a bit early.

Why wouldn't one question the St. Olaf coach? Just seems odd that they'd win the XC championship but fail to get anyone in the distance finals for both 2013 and 2014. Perhaps they remained underdogs because the coach continued to treat them as underdogs rather than champions.

I still think they have a chance to defend their championship as they are coming back with most of their scorers, but North Central certainly are dominating in the distance events and look very hard to beat next fall despite losing Crain and Klein.

Fastnbulbous wrote:

Why wouldn't one question the St. Olaf coach? Just seems odd that they'd win the XC championship but fail to get anyone in the distance finals for both 2013 and 2014. Perhaps they remained underdogs because the coach continued to treat them as underdogs rather than champions.

I still think they have a chance to defend their championship as they are coming back with most of their scorers, but North Central certainly are dominating in the distance events and look very hard to beat next fall despite losing Crain and Klein.

You seem to not get it. St. Olaf didn't fail to get people to nationals. Wintheiser was second in the 3k at indoor nats and probably would have been 3rd on Saturday in the 5k. There's nothing that makes me believe Padgett would have beaten him aside from raw PR's. Campbell made it into the 5k at indoor nats and has PR's of 3:50 and 14:37. Phillip Meyer (Their sixth guy) won the 10k by a significant margin at conference over a 14:49 runner. Jake Brown did skiing all winter, came back for not even a month of real training, won with a 9:09 in the steeple and got 3rd in the 5k later that day at MIACs. This team can run fast at the distance events, but if they want to run fast 1500's, who cares? They should be the favorites for cross next year. Why wouldn't they step their game up? They're only losing one from their top five.

My point was that St. Olaf runners clearly SHOULD have been capable of making the [outdoors] distance finals. Which is why I wondered what is going on with the coach.

I agree that Wintheiser was good enough for top 3 in the 5000. So why didn't he run it? He would have had over 2.5 hrs to recover, and it was the last event of the day. It just seems like a wasted opportunity. It's freakin' nationals!

Fastnbulbous wrote:

My point was that St. Olaf runners clearly SHOULD have been capable of making the [outdoors] distance finals. Which is why I wondered what is going on with the coach.

I agree that Wintheiser was good enough for top 3 in the 5000. So why didn't he run it? He would have had over 2.5 hrs to recover, and it was the last event of the day. It just seems like a wasted opportunity. It's freakin' nationals!

Again, Wintheiser "made" the 5,000 field. He elected not to double back from the 1500. Why not? You'd have to ask him. He was injured quite a bit last track season, so maybe he thought that backing off might be a good idea. St. Olaf didn't have a team race to worry about, and as was pointed out, the other doublers didn't exactly light it up, including McKenna Ramos in the 800.

I guess I don't see the big deal about not being in the "distance" events when St. Olaf put three finalists in the 1500 and placed two in the top 4. Coby Horowitz didn't even go to nationals. Is there something wrong with his coach?

Fastnbulbous wrote:

I agree that Wintheiser was good enough for top 3 in the 5000. So why didn't he run it? He would have had over 2.5 hrs to recover, and it was the last event of the day. It just seems like a wasted opportunity. It's freakin' nationals!

If Wintheiser would have run the 5K fresh he very well could have been top 3, but it's no guarantee. Doubling back after the 1500 there's almost no way that would have happened and it's more likely that he would have been a non-factor. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think anybody has doubled back from the 1500 to get All American in the 5K since Will Leer won both events in 2007. I don't think it's an insult to Grant to say that he's not Will Leer. Before declarations my guess is he knew that he wasn't going to be the favorite in either event, so he went with the one that he thought he had a better shot at pulling off an upset in. Running the 1500 made sense - he raced Ramos to the line in a 1500 in April, whereas Crain beat him fairly convincingly at both indoor nationals and Drake.

You posted similar comments criticizing St Olaf's coaches last spring. Why do you care so much?

But I'm not talking about just one runner, I'm talking about the whole team. It seems kind of blase to skip an opportunity to run a final at the biggest meet of the year. Wintheiser seemed healthy and running to his ability in the 1500.

It's too bad that reporting is so terrible for D3, we never hear about the real stories. One theory could be that the coach seems to clearly be prioritizing cross country and compromising success in track in order to make sure everyone is on point for the XC season. Considering the success last fall, perhaps it was a compromise worth making. I just wonder if any of the athletes were frustrated that maybe they weren't allowed to run a last-chance meet in order to qualify for nationals, or (less likely obviously so don't get your panties in a bunch) track is just one long base build-up for XC.

Two 1500 all americans and another in the final is hardly compromising the track season. Also, you have no hard facts in any of your posts. Speculate all you want.

Not allowed to run last chance meets? They went to La Crosse. Nobody achieved national times there. Where are you getting this stuff?

jiggy wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think anybody has doubled back from the 1500 to get All American in the 5K since Will Leer won both events in 2007.

Men's side recent history (women's side is different):

2013:

Horton: top seed in the 5000, enters the 1500 too. Doesn't make it out of the heats in the 1500, then 15th in the 5000 final.

Horowitz: AA in the 1500. 8th in the slow 5000 in a kicker's race. (AA in both)

Schilit: 2nd in the 1500. 10th in the 5000 (3rd best time going in).

Kerk: 15th in the 1500, Last in 15:28 in the 5000.

2012:

Deichert (Hamline): 2nd in the 1500. DNF in the 5000.

the 1500-5000 double is very hard if you're male. Steeple-5000 double is even worse, judging by the past three years now that they've added heats.

Google and tfrrs are your friends. There's no big mystery here. Here's a breakdown on St. Olaf's top 7 from NCAAs.

Grant Wintheiser (3rd): 4th in 1500

Jake Brown (8th): skied (won UCSA national title), ran 9:09 steeple, would have made NCAAs, elected not to enter for reasons unknown.

Brian Saksa (17th): injured most of track season, ran 1:53/3:55, ran at Last Chance, didn't qualify.

Jake Campbell (31st): 11th in 1500 final at NCAAs.

Calvin Lehn (65th): no outdoor marks. Injury? Semester abroad?

Phillip Myer (75th): Ran 31:02, won MIAC 10k, ran 1500 at last chance, didn't qualify.

Dillon Davis (122nd): Steepled 9:24 at last chance, didn't qualify.

Couplayearsago wrote:

Anyone know what happened to Kyle Brady and Mike Spain of North Central? Did they quit running?

Spain is (was?) helping coach at ISU while he was in grad school.

I know Brady is injured right now -- I saw him pull out at Shamrock just before the mile.

Both have helped pace the elite women at the Chicago Marathon

-- Brady ran a 14:12ish a year or two back.

Spain was 23:59 and Brady was 24:01 at Shamrock a year or so back.

illinoisphotographer wrote:

Couplayearsago wrote:

Anyone know what happened to Kyle Brady and Mike Spain of North Central? Did they quit running?

-- Brady ran a 14:12ish a year or two back.

Spain was 23:59 and Brady was 24:01 at Shamrock a year or so back.

Both of these races were in 2012 (Spain's first year after graduation, Brady's 2nd).

gevult wrote:

Two 1500 all americans and another in the final is hardly compromising the track season. Also, you have no hard facts in any of your posts. Speculate all you want.

Not allowed to run last chance meets? They went to La Crosse. Nobody achieved national times there. Where are you getting this stuff?

I was simply asking questions, not making anything up. My whole point is that very few hard facts are reported for D3 track. Is it impossible for anyone to reply without being a dick about it FFS?

Once again, I'm talking about the distance events. I'm just curious what the coach's problem is with distance events. Yes, I know that the whole damn team ran the 1500 at LaCrosse, including Saksa and Lemke:

3 Campbell, Jake SO St. Olaf 3:54.39 1

5 Saksa, Brian SR St. Olaf 3:55.80 1

9 Lemke, Stefan SR St. Olaf 3:58.71 2

17 Meyer, Phillip JR St. Olaf 4:02.17 3

18 Coffey, Joe FR St. Olaf 4:02.46 3

24 Escher, Paul SO St. Olaf 4:05.66 1

Too bad about Saksa, he was getting back in shape fast, but just ran out of time. I guess the coach was having dreams of sweeping the top 4 spots in the 1500 or something. Grant, Campbell, Meyer, maybe Lemke may have done just as well in the 5000.