Footlocker South aka The Drew Hunter Show!

I think it's a mark of how much hype Hunter gets that I'm a little disappointed he "only" ran 14:22 and got the course record from McGorty by 6 seconds. It's ridiculous that I expected better, but perhaps he wasn't going all out.

And while Hunter is incredibly good, you can never assume someone's unbeatable. Rocha or Tamagno could beat him if they had great days, or someone else relatively under the radar. That said, I hope Hunter goes for the footlocker record. He could get close.

4:26 opening mile, so I think he was going all out.

Agreed. Reportedly came through around 9:09-10 at the two mile. Fastest splits that race has ever had. It's hard not to resist trying to blast a good time your senior year when the weather is perfect. It was roughly 60-63 degrees.

Its a better time than it seems. The course was shorter in the past and recently lengthed die to construction. They added a ~85m section so hunter would have possible been 14:0x on the older course.

Hunter is really good. As always, though, you should totally ignore times on the Footlocker south XC course.

This can't be correct. The previous course was short all these years?

Coursewaschanged wrote:

Its a better time than it seems. The course was shorter in the past and recently lengthed die to construction. They added a ~85m section so hunter would have possible been 14:0x on the older course.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Hunter is really good. As always, though, you should totally ignore times on the Footlocker south XC course.

I agree. People are so obsessed with times in cross country. It's ruining the sport. What people need to look at are the match ups. Hunter broke the record by 6 seconds. Both probably ran mostly alone, so all things considered, that's how good Hunter is.

These days everyone wants to run on a golf course, downhill, track for their 5k PRs to boast about instead of get dirty in a real head-to-head race.

Yes, it's always been short. The section they added was maybe 50-60m, not 85.

Are there any sites that have more detailed descriptions of the races?

Especially I'm interested in the top 10 girls / boys, how they ran, and their chances in the finals.

douchelin^3 wrote:

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Hunter is really good. As always, though, you should totally ignore times on the Footlocker south XC course.

I agree. People are so obsessed with times in cross country. It's ruining the sport. What people need to look at are the match ups. Hunter broke the record by 6 seconds. Both probably ran mostly alone, so all things considered, that's how good Hunter is.

These days everyone wants to run on a golf course, downhill, track for their 5k PRs to boast about instead of get dirty in a real head-to-head race.

Hunter is facing everyone at nationals, and one of his best qualities is that he's a fantastic competitor who will do anything to win. His battle with Fisher is one of the greatest 2 miles of all time, and if anyone can challenge him at footlocker, there's sure to be something great to watch.

Official time was 14:26. Sounds like 4:26-4:44-4:45ish if eyewitness accounts on this thread are correct. Very, very good time. Probably puts him around 14:45-:48 at a course like FLMW/Kenosha (on a nice day at Kenosha- they had to use their alternate course today because of conditions there).

Besides being happy that the guy crushed it and looks great, I really love how pissy it will make hordes of letsrunners knowing he is coached by tinman.

Right, and nothing against Hunter, but every couple years somebody vlazes the FL South course in particular and gets named the favorite based on that performance. Seen that dynamic going back at least to Bumbalough.

A sophomore from Tennessee won the NXN Southeast.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Right, and nothing against Hunter, but every couple years somebody vlazes the FL South course in particular and gets named the favorite based on that performance. Seen that dynamic going back at least to Bumbalough.

While that's true, Hunter is the class of the field based on track times and previous xc dominance as well. Could he get 10th in two weeks? Sure. Will he get something outside the top 3? Probably not.

Course did not run as fast today as it did in previous years. Look at the 10th place time compared to usual. Hunters 14:26 was worth 14:10 on a better day. He'll win Nats. Had a 30 second lead at the half way point. It was unreal.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

Right, and nothing against Hunter, but every couple years somebody vlazes the FL South course in particular and gets named the favorite based on that performance. Seen that dynamic going back at least to Bumbalough.

And Bumbalough was a close second at nationals while sick. He absolutely was the favorite and the best runner that year.

The way Hunter crushed Fisher the last lap of their two mile leads me to believe that he could end up topping all of Verzbicas' times this year, with even a small improvement.