XC Super region breakdown - FAIR? Your conclusions???

Super regionals are a bad idea. With the addition of another race, most teams will have 5 important races on their schedules. (Prenats or something like it ( there are still going to be some at large), conference, regionals, super regionals and nationals) This is too many. Lets try to use the available information to pick the top 31 teams to run at nationals. Most would say that polls are capable of seperating a top 20 team from the 31st spot. (For those who don't how about top 15?) To make sure, lets conduct the polls in rounds so that each week another few teams get picked. For example, Stanford and Wisco may not even have to run a race to earn their national berths in early September. Teams on the bubble of top 20 like say William and Mary, might not get their berth until they run well at their conference meet. This way the spotlight is shown further and further down the list each week so the teams just a little weaker than the ones selected the previous week will be talked about. It is unlikely that by the end of conference meets that there will be many teams still hiding so that the group that is voting for the poll will not know them. If they are then they can still run their way in.

The last 11 (or 16) are picked in a nationals qualifying meet that the top bunch of teams do not have to run. Since prenats run as many as 38 teams, it should be possible to run a meet with say 38 teams to determine the last 11 spots. If there are more than 38 teams interested in paying the travel costs, teams can be seeded with the top 38 and the rest in a second. If the total time of a scoring five in the second race happens to be in the top 11 (or 16) teams in the seeded qualifying race, they go. Let the unseeded race go first so the seeded teams know the time they have to beat. In this format, the last few teams of the seeded race will always be beaten by the first few teams in the unseeded race but who cares these teams are in the mid 50's for overall ranking, not even close to the 31 that matter. The numbers of poll and race selected teams are just examples. While some might say it would be better to have only 10 poll teams and pick 21 out of 38, this would make getting in the seeded qualifying race too important.

Flame away!

Everyone complained all season about the system. But in the end for the most part, the teams that should have got in--got in. There were a few exceptions, but all in all in was fair. With the current system, it doesn't matter if you're 8th in the regional (like great lakes, you can still get in if you have the points. The argument for this is...what if we get bumped by someone with no points (such as miama of ohio in this year's Great Lakes). If that happens...too damn bad. Looks like you shouldn't be in the meet. The good teams should make it each year regardless of how strong their region is. In fact, you have a better chance in a strong region because you can beat another strong team with points.