Wow: Japanese HS team has better top 7 5k average pb (14:01) than Syracuse (14:02)!!

As far as Cheserek goes, well, considering that he is Kenyan (and in fact had already won a Kenyan junior, youth, or hs national championship before coming to hs in New Jersey), I wouldn't want to include him in the comparison to indicate how strong American distance running is at the collegiate level. In fact, he is not even a top tier Kenyan at present and dominates on the level. When he becomes an American citizen, he will be an American but still won't validate our running system in the sense that he was not developed here. But I will cheer for him when he represents the U.S.

jjjjj wrote:

If you wanted to compare a Kenyan high school team to an American college team, by all means, do that. St. Patrick's, say, is no doubt faster than any American college team--particularly if you were able to get them to run at sea level. But to compare a Japanese high school team to an American college team, and then include a Kenyan who has been brought there solely to run to show that the Japanese system is better is completely misleading. Nothing at all wrong with him being Kenyan, but don't include him in the comparison with a Japanese set of runners.

Except you included a Canadian "foreigner" in the college team.

jjjjj wrote:

21 second margin. and I am counting Knight for Syracuse because he comes from a town within 100 or 200 miles from Syracuse.

Yes, Knight came from a town close to Syracuse, but he was a product of the Canadian system. In fact, he's even less legitimate for inclusion than Cheserek, considering Cheserek spent the entirety of his HS years here while Knight arrived in the US less than 2 years ago.

In fact, just as Cheserek used to be a youth District Champion in Kenya, Knight was the Canadian Junior XC Champion before coming to America.

Again, the fact that he was somewhat close to the US doesn't make him part of the US system.

Article about their win at: http://japanrunningnews.blogspot.com/2015/12/sera-breaks-national-high-school-boys.html

survey says wrote:

dont believe it wrote:

I will believe it when the japs win any international competition, at any level ever. Youd think they would be racking up the junior world xc points if their high schoolers were actually this great.

Um, yeah, look at the results, they do.

Looks like the US beat Japan in the last world junior XC meet.

I'll post it again for page 2:Yeah, they are racking up points, like 200 to Kenya's 19 and U.S. 132, for 9th team overall (U.S. 6th). Their #1 guy would be #4 for U.S., and that is without Fisher or McGorty. Of course if this was run in Japan they would be #1 lol.http://www.iaaf.org/results/ia...final/team

letssee wrote:

survey says wrote:

Um, yeah, look at the results, they do.

Looks like the US beat Japan in the last world junior XC meet.

The question presumes a team would want to come to USA. NXN would conflict with the regional qualifying rounds for the Japan national championships. And with the training schedule for teams that do qualify for nationals. The Japan national ekiden championship is the culmination of their high school careers, the last big race ever for a majority of the kids. At least 4 hours of primetime national television coverage on the nation's most important TV and radio network. NXN is a quasi championship that only a few people even know about. At best NXN might attract a local second tier team, opting out of the ekiden regional round; definitely not one of the top 100 teams.

My colleague runs at one of these high schools in Japan, Nagano prefecture. He says that the training they undergo would be considered "abuse" in the USA: constant berating, physical punishment, psychological warfare. Pretty interesting stuff.