Official 2016 D3 Cross Country Thread

D3 has been pulling awesome hs talent and i think they'll continue to do so but not because of it's competitiveness. Its the quality of schools in D3, particularly in the midwest. They provide quality, affordable education in addition to outstanding competitive opportunities. Coaches shouldn't necessarily look at the fastest guys one the track, but the ones with the most upside. The best D3 guys usually have pretty mediocre HS times but had exceptional 3200m marks relative to their 1600m. Coaches should look for signs of talent rather than just times.

Also, not every sectional and state champion is D1 material. Sorry but a 9:30 just isnt D1 caliber... even if you're the best in your area. This is clearly a sign of talent, but don't let the ego boost and sex appeal of running D1 overshadow the competitive opportunities D3 schools have to offer. The neat thing about running is you can be as good as you are willing to hurt for, and any capable program/coach will get you there. I think this realization by some high school athletes is in part responsible for the rise in competition in recent years.

Right on! 100%. I think on top of that a lot of programs are instantly over looked because they simply aren't a top 10 team. But don't let this fool you. Look at what progress athletes have made from year to year. Have they gotten faster each year? Has the team gotten better each year? Are athletes making large improvements in single seasons? THIS will give you a better sense of the quality of a school's program than just fast times on the board. Talented athletes graduate, but coaches build programs. If you can answer yes to all the questions above, then the tools are there to help you become as good as you want to be.

Every other guy in D3 history? I think you young fellows are forgetting how good some of the older generation was on the cross course, where you can not compare times. Track times are without a doubt better than 5 years ago, and those better than 10 years ago. Josh Moen and Macharia Yuot deserve to be in this conversation. Moen was fifth at club nationals in 04 against some very good competition. Moen would have beaten Lamere.

1 Torres, Jorge 24 unattached / Reebok 32:43.91

2 Goucher, Adam 29 unattached / Nike 32:59.45

3 Torres, Edwardo 24 unattached / Reebok 33:04.04

4 Riley, Jonathon 26 unattached / Nike 33:04.74

5 Moen, Josh 22 Wartburg College 33:07.28

Clown Answer Bro wrote:

Every other guy in D3 history? I think you young fellows are forgetting how good some of the older generation was on the cross course, where you can not compare times. Track times are without a doubt better than 5 years ago, and those better than 10 years ago. Josh Moen and Macharia Yuot deserve to be in this conversation. Moen was fifth at club nationals in 04 against some very good competition. Moen would have beaten Lamere.

1 Torres, Jorge 24 unattached / Reebok 32:43.91

2 Goucher, Adam 29 unattached / Nike 32:59.45

3 Torres, Edwardo 24 unattached / Reebok 33:04.04

4 Riley, Jonathon 26 unattached / Nike 33:04.74

5 Moen, Josh 22 Wartburg College 33:07.28

Lamere would CRUSH Moen.

Clown Answer Bro wrote:

Every other guy in D3 history? I think you young fellows are forgetting how good some of the older generation was on the cross course, where you can not compare times. Track times are without a doubt better than 5 years ago, and those better than 10 years ago. Josh Moen and Macharia Yuot deserve to be in this conversation. Moen was fifth at club nationals in 04 against some very good competition. Moen would have beaten Lamere.

1 Torres, Jorge 24 unattached / Reebok 32:43.91

2 Goucher, Adam 29 unattached / Nike 32:59.45

3 Torres, Edwardo 24 unattached / Reebok 33:04.04

4 Riley, Jonathon 26 unattached / Nike 33:04.74

5 Moen, Josh 22 Wartburg College 33:07.28

No. Just, no. Moen would look JV in a head to head race with LaMere. Like the other guy said, HE DOESN'T LET IT COME DOWN TO A KICK. Why is that so hard for you to understand?

Did someone just say that a guy would beat a 28:38 guy and cite a 33:07 time as proof ? Troll or am I missing something?

Sayagain wrote:

Did someone just say that a guy would beat a 28:38 guy and cite a 33:07 time as proof ? Troll or am I missing something?

Extremely slow course.

Jorge Torres 10k PR: 27:42

Adam Goucher 10k PR: 27:59

Edwardo Torres 10k PR: 28:16

I don't think any of them had run those PRs at the time, but J. Torres and Adam Goucher were former D1 champs. I'm not sure if he'd have beaten Lamere, but Moen was really good.

Moen was an absolute stud. Went on to get second in US nats 10 mile in something like 46:40 a few years later. You really think he would have looked JV? That's just ignorant. Him and Lamere would have been a hell of a race. Ryan Bak from a few year earlier was a stud as well.

Wiac for life wrote:

Moen was an absolute stud. Went on to get second in US nats 10 mile in something like 46:40 a few years later. You really think he would have looked JV? That's just ignorant. Him and Lamere would have been a hell of a race. Ryan Bak from a few year earlier was a stud as well.

As a matter of fact I do think he would make him look JV. You can argue that Thorson could have beat Moen, and LaMere made Thorson look JV at conference, regionals, and nationals.

Why are you referencing future times when we are discussing their abilities at the height of their collegiate careers? I don't dare mention LaMere still has a whole year to improve his records (aka hasn't reached his height)....you must have close ties with Moen.

Moen only ran 14:34 indoors in 2004. I am doubtful he would've crushed Lamere. At the very least, we can say they were both very good.

Many forget Macharia Yuot was able to fly to philadelphia the day after his '06 nationals victory to run 2:25 for 5th in the philly marathon.

I think a team that deserves mention in this thread is Haverford.I ran in the mideast region and was struck by how many returners they had. my team ran at rowan and they had some really good guys. they had 9 or so guys finish before my team's 4th despite the fact that we were pretty good (made nationals, underperformed there though)

This is their top returners:

Gorman - 2nd at Centennial XC champs behind Marquardt

Woods - 14:55

Brier - 14:59

Peet - 15:02

Hale - consistently close to peet in xc

Hamilton - basically same situation as hale (25:40 8K on rowan course)

I've watched every XC championship in person since 2003 (Moen's first year winning) to 2015 (when Lamere won). Lamere's performance was that of an all-timer -- there is just absolutely no doubt about that. But it's just a typical internet hyperbolic and over-the-top statement to say he'd make Moen look "JV." When you're a two-time XC champion (the only one this century on the men's side), no one is going to make you look JV.

family yellow day wrote:

I've watched every XC championship in person since 2003 (Moen's first year winning) to 2015 (when Lamere won). Lamere's performance was that of an all-timer -- there is just absolutely no doubt about that. But it's just a typical internet hyperbolic and over-the-top statement to say he'd make Moen look "JV." When you're a two-time XC champion (the only one this century on the men's side), no one is going to make you look JV.

That, with respect, is BS. It doesn't matter how many XC championships Moen won. What matters is the skill of the runner. Would Cheserek make Moen look JV? Absolutely, yes. How about Futsum? Yep. LaMere would have had the 3rd best 10k time in all of D1 this year had he run D1. He's simply in a different class from any D3 runner. Thorson obliterated everyone in track all year, and Lamere made him look silly at NCAAs this spring. And he beat him by 41 seconds in XC. Ian Lamere would have destroyed Moen.

family yellow day wrote:

I've watched every XC championship in person since 2003 (Moen's first year winning) to 2015 (when Lamere won). Lamere's performance was that of an all-timer -- there is just absolutely no doubt about that. But it's just a typical internet hyperbolic and over-the-top statement to say he'd make Moen look "JV." When you're a two-time XC champion (the only one this century on the men's side), no one is going to make you look JV.

Moen was clearly very good, but I will tell you three reasons why it is not a hyperbole to say Lamere would make him look JV:

1.) If you're going to use championships as you're marker then LaMere still wins. He has twice as many national titles as Moen and still has a full year of eligibility left.

2.) If you use margin of victory as the marker then Lamere wins handily, and both won over runners with national titles. When Moen won his second xc title, he won with a 24:28.7 on the Eau-Claire course with a margin of 13 seconds between him and second place. On the same course this year, Lamere ran the same exact time (24:28.1) HOWEVER, there were 3 individuals who finished behind Lamere withing the 13 second margin Moen won his title in, 2 of which also raced at nats. Not only did Lamere go on to win nationals with a larger margin of victory than Moen, but he also did it against better competition.

3.) The times. Plain and simple. A 23:34 at nationals after separating from the pack half way through is ridiculous. Plus Lamere has far more impressive track times. Moen was clearly a very strong legged runner so on a hilly course he would atleast be within 15-20 seconds of Lamere, but on anything even remotely flat Lamere would run away from him.

Moen won 5 National titles. LaMere has 5 titles to date. 5 is twice as many as 5?

LaMere won by nearly 40 seconds in 2015. Moen won by nearly 30 seconds in 2003 -- though you cherry picked his 2004 margin to make the comparison more extreme. Nice try.

I do think the competition is deeper and better now than it was a decade ago. I think this is true across the board at just about every level from high school to the pros.

But more to the point: you can't put too much stock in comparing times across courses or even margins of victories. Conditions factor in a lot. Courses change over time. And races play out a different way. I think it's fair to say that at some point, Thorson stopped racing for the win and started focusing on making sure he beat Mazaheri in 2015. And in 2004, Moen stayed with the pack until 3K, at which point he said he felt too good and moved away (even though his plan was to wait until 5K).

It's hard to even know where to begin when someone brings up comparing times in cross country.

Again, you can't argue times in cross country.

Listen, if you were to ask me who I think would win if they each raced each other in their primes in cross country, I would choose LaMere. But it's misguided and disrespectful to think that anyone good enough to beat the entirety of Division III would look embarrassed against any of those other champions. Especially the only two-time champ since 1990. C'mon.

What's with this Josh Moen talk? He would lose handily to King Lamere. A better race would be Lamere and my son, Jamie Norton, who runs the mile in 4:06. Lamere hasn't run the mile in 4:06 so he might lose if he needs to run a 4:06 mile. A 4:06 would be much easier for Jamie Norton because he has run the mile in 4:06.

Ol' Drippy wrote:

Extremely slow course.

Jorge Torres 10k PR: 27:42

Adam Goucher 10k PR: 27:59

Edwardo Torres 10k PR: 28:16

I don't think any of them had run those PRs at the time, but J. Torres and Adam Goucher were former D1 champs. I'm not sure if he'd have beaten Lamere, but Moen was really good.

Not arguing whether Moen could beat Lamere though I doubt it but what was Moen's 10k PR? Looks silly to use a time ~4:30 slower to compare runners regardless of course difficulty. Compare apples to apples.

This is a painfully boring topic of conversation. Who cares about Ian Lamere? Someone get him a pair of shorts so I don't have to see that phat a$$ jiggling around in those orange half tights.

An earlier poster threw Loras into a projected top 10, which is just preposterous. Why is it so hard to ignore the obvious: Amherst and Tufts will be in the top ten this year.

J fine 2:09 wrote:

An earlier poster threw Loras into a projected top 10, which is just preposterous. Why is it so hard to ignore the obvious: Amherst and Tufts will be in the top ten this year.

What about Amherst and tufts makes you think they have a chance at being top 10 this year and Loras doesn't? Also out of ALL the teams on that list, Loras was the one you had a problem with? Really?

Jamie Norton is gone. Tufts has no chance anymore! Without the 4:06 miler, there is no hope.