Coach's lying about seed times

Concerned, This has always been a major problem. I once won a major invitational in college out of the middle heat because my coach would not lie to get me in the fast heat. All you can do is hope ohters are in the same boat and do the best you can under the circumstances. I once coached a high school meet (I know most collegiate meets are unscored so this wouldn't apply)in which a team lost points from their team score for each athlete performing below their entry mark. this not only reduced the lying, but actually had coaches underestimating their athletes. Good luck and go get 'em!

Obviously it's too bad. But it happens, it's an accepted feature of invitationals, and it isn't going to stop anytime soon. At the end of the day, most people find themselves in a decent race, run a good time, and are happy. No one really worries about what seed time was where.

Just the facts wrote:

Concerned, This has always been a major problem. I once won a major invitational in college out of the middle heat because my coach would not lie to get me in the fast heat.

That's a shame. I once won the national championship in the steeplechase (and set an AR to boot) without a qualifying mark, only because my coach had the balls to give me a few tenths to make it possible.

Beat that!

if the meet director doesnt check the accuracy of the times, then lie to get in the meet. simple as that.

it is a shame that this occurs in our sport. a basketball coach can't lie about his record and have his team invited to the NCAA field of 64.

a football coach can't lie to get in the Rose Bowl.

yet time and time again, track coaches with no dignity lie about their athletes performances to get them in a heat where they don't belong.

i know a major BIG 12 coach who refuses to lie. he has integrity, and he knows that with the coaching knowledge of his staff, and the work ethic and preparedness of his athletes, they will run fast from any heat.

but it would be nice if coaches would come to a gentlemen's agreement to do the right thing.

seed times at invitationals are supposed to be what you think you can run, not what you have run

where are the entry lists at on the site? i couldnt find em. someone post a link.

Two most ridiculous seed times I've ever seen at high school meets:

Boys SMR 3:18 (must've forgotten a 200 leg...or the 400 leg).

Girls shuttle hurdles indoors: 29.0

Needless to say, neither team ran nearly as fast as they were seeded. Actually, I don't even think either team won and these were just from crappy indoor meets.

a coaches job is to put a runner in the right shape, right frame of mind and right place to run their best.

i've heard that in order to get into penn relays one's coach does not just put down a seed time. they pretty much have to make a portfolio and show results from races you've run. if all the big meets did this there would be no problems.

r-dog is right. Lying is not the right word because you are putting in expected times not past performance times. How do you enter a runner's seed time if he's never run the event? You put the expected time. My coach once entered me at 3:43 when my PR was 3:48 and I wound up running 3:44.1. If I was entered at my PR time I would not have made the fast section and would not have made the new PR.

Coming into the Penn Relays you are entering 4X800 teams that haven't posted a time yet or a 10,000m runnner that is running his first race of the year or ever. The whole thing is a bit of a game. Your coach should be entering you at a time that puts you in a competive heat. If your coach thinks you can run with a particular person then he should enter you at the same seed time regardless of whether you have run that time before.

You cannot lie about a seed time (unless it is a meet requiring a qualifying standard).

Scooter, I understand what you are saying, but many entries ask for 'season's best mark'. Using your scenario: You have run 3:48, enter @ 3:43 and run 3:44. Another guy has run 3:44, enters honestly at @ 3:44, and runs 3:44 in the slow heat, yet may have been the winner in the fast heat. Because this is such a common practice (Your coach entering you 5 seconds too fast), the other guys coach will enter him 5 seconds fast next week in 3:39. So on and so on, until guys like the first poster can't get into the heat he belongs because his coach is not entering him at 3:26. For every case in which it works out, like it did for you, there are 5-6 people stinking it up in the wrong heat. The coaches are hoping for some miracle Billy Mills-like breakthrough. They don't understand physiology enough to enter them in a race that best suits their long-term progress, and we wonder why americans don't have great long-term training programs from most collegiate coaches.

the whole point is coaches regester their runners with times they feel the runners are capable of, whether or not the coaches are being over ambitious they havew to get their runners in the type of race that would allow them to run the optimal time, simply by placing them at that pace.

not true

It's always interesting to see what marks coaches will put up for guys when they come to meets here at ISU, especially our big-invite in February, and the last-chance meet. It always works out in the end, since everyone does it, and some last minute shuffling by our coaches helps, too.

No.

The seed time is the time most recently run in a race. Or a time trial. If the athlete hasn't done it yet, then you use something from last year. Seed times are NOT predictions of performance.

It comes down to "going with the flow,' i.e. lying because everyone else does, or having the balls to stick with the truth.

For the examples given above - look, the athlete with an honest coach gets put into a "slow" heat ONCE.

Our club team coaches used to go through this every year - first meet of the season, folks who'd been practicing with us for 2 or 3 months would tell the coach seed times that were their PRs or below. We would only put in a time they'd already run, or one based on their workouts thus far. They'd get in the right heat, but beat all the people seeded ahead of them with false times.

The other half of the peeve: Entering the larger road races, who put up pace signs to group the runners, putting yourself in the 5:00/mile pace group and suddenly realizing you're surrounded by overweight people in cotton sweats wearing headphones.

yep, jsut like your coach did you, wintermix.

If you read a little further about Terrier, you would find that Coach Schuder, tired of the garbage seeding, only asked for the BEST times for the last 12 months, outdoor or indoor. Thus all of the seed times are in fact, very real.

He asked on the entry form for the name of the meet too and the date -- essentially saying that if he or any of his staff went and looked at the results from the meet in question and found something incorrect, the athlete was banned, the team might get banned, the works.

With the power of the internet, "recent best" is a great way to weed out the liars. I think Schuder has done a great job with this idea. Yes, the fact that Sam Burley is seeded at 1:45.39 is quite a stretch for this part of the season, but with everyone putting their PR's down, it will ensure a good race. I think for the Valentine meet, he is asking for 2002-2003 indoor PR's, with time and place, as opposed to 12 month PR's, because by mid-February most people will have indoor times.