Official 2016 D3 Cross Country Thread

Doesn't matter if you work super hard, all about how smart you train. UWL does 200m repeats in the middle of July. Imagine how much better they'd be if they trained smarter. Unfortunately they are content with being top 5 year in year out, but not motivated to be smarter and go for top 2. They definitely get the best talent in the country, yet don't produce. Just like the Badgers.

Except, I don't think the Badgers do 200m repeats in mid July

Yeah what happened to doing long powerwalks

I would argue that Tufts did a pretty good job of meeting the specified/published criteria. The published criteria is regional performance, head to head with teams in the field and other at-large, common opponents, and regional meet results (aka point gaps). Since the priority has been generally accepted as the #1 criteria: regional performance, and there has never been any indication of out of region wins (or any other criteria) weighing more than regional performance you can't argue that their coach did a disservice by not putting them in position to advance. That Paul Short race put them head to head with the south region #1 and atlantic region #3... they narrowly beat CNU and lost to SLU. They tied Midd at NESCAC's, and ended up 6pts behind them at regionals. I would say based on most people's understanding of the criteria they set themselves up to get a bid.

Also.. how do you know that Tufts has enough money to go to more meets out of region? You can't even bring that up as a reason they teams shouldn't get in... that would be opposite of the spirit of division III athletics - where the wealth or lack of wealth of a program should not determine their ability to advance. Another note on that front is now you a re saying tat DIII programs are supposed to make their kids miss more class to travel to more out of region competitions? Again, counter to the DIII philosophy. Does that mean that teams from schools that can only miss 3 Friday classes in a term don't deserve to go because they didn't go to more out of regional competitions? Or that school X with a tiny travel budget isn't worthy of a bid because they an't afford to go to Purple Valley, Oshkosh, and Rowan? This is not DI you can't expect kids to miss 4 Fridays of class and for teams to have the budget to travel across the country... or even to another nearby region. That's just not how DIII works.

What's wrong with 200s at any point of the season? Please produce the optimal training plan that ALL should use.

UWL has the optimal training plan for all. They do, after all, employ an expert scientific consultant, http://www.systembasedtraining.com/. NCC needs to get with the times. #science

Chubby Badger wrote:

i seen it man wrote:

Doesn't matter if you work super hard, all about how smart you train. UWL does 200m repeats in the middle of July. Imagine how much better they'd be if they trained smarter. Unfortunately they are content with being top 5 year in year out, but not motivated to be smarter and go for top 2. They definitely get the best talent in the country, yet don't produce. Just like the Badgers.

Except, I don't think the Badgers do 200m repeats in mid July

What's wrong with 200s at any point of the season? Please produce the optimal training plan that ALL should use.

200's at mile pace. UWL should have gotten 2nd this year, they BOMBED nats. Yes, 6th place is bombing. Like I said, be content with top 6 with the best recruits in the nation (D3). You're under-performing. Should be winning with D1 talent.

We use science you witless pinhead. What more can you do than use science...

ItsScienceBro wrote:

We use science you witless pinhead. What more can you do than use science...

Follow the Church. Evolution isn't real, bro.

Tufts chose to not run their top guys at Purple Valley, which I think was a pretty key meet for comparing NE to the Atlantic (NYU and Genny were both there against a number of top NE teams). I understand wanting to be fresh for Paul Short, but at least train through and still compete. Tufts was certainly not good enough to be "too good" for purple valley...

Nyu did not run enough of their top guys at purple valley for that meet to count as a head to head win

Quick question to you all mid rant. What is a time to get onto a decent DIII team? I am a junior with an 18:43 pr but I've been dropping about 1:20 every season. Hopeful schools are Chicago and Swarthmore (I know they aren't great for running). Would a 17:30 be sufficient? And I seen it, what do you define as the DI talent at UWL?

You'll be fine with your 18:43. That said, improvement would still help your chances depending on if the team does cuts or not.

Plus, who know! You might improve at a dramatic rate once in college. It has happened plenty in the past couple of years (I run in the midwest, so examples are regionalized):

(Name - High School times - collegiate accolades)

Ian Lamere (UW-Platteville) - 4:52 1600m/16:20 5k - 5x national champion

Jake Campbell (Saint Olaf) - 4:33 1600m/9:54 3200m - 3k/1500m national champion

Ryan Bugler (Saint John's) - 10:03 3200m/17:30 5k - Steeplechase national champion

Thomas Schultz (UWL) - 10:12 3200m - 10k All American as a freshman

Jordan Carpenter (UW-Oshkosh) - 4:34 1600m - 4x All American

Zach Plank (North Central) - 9:54 3200m - 4x All American

The list can go on, but this is what I can remember off-hand.

Long story short, there is always room for improvement once you go to college.

How the hell did Schultz get so good so fast...his 1600 pace in high school became his 10k pace in the space of a year. That's insane.

In one year, no less. That is impressive.

As with him, and the others I'm sure, they must have all been undertrained in high school. Shultz probably just put in a big enough summer before freshman year to catch up faster.

These are impressive jumps.

Anyone have any east or west coast examples?

Some good analysis of the committee's selections here. What about Nebraska Wesleyan from the Central Region? They certainly did not beat anyone at Paul Short but they beat Wartburg at IIAC championship and was just 2 points behind Loras. Then at region meet they were 4th only 14 points behind St. Olaf. They ran well when it counted at conference and regional. I heard Central region coaches were pretty upset.

The central regional coaches were pretty angry.

But they weren't the only ones to notice it. I heard from a number of coaches from the west coast and even the south region who talk about how Nebraska Wesleyan was short changed.

So NCC vs NAU in a 9k dual meet, who ya got?

Question. How come in D3 top 35 get all-american but in D1 and D2 it's top 40?

Goat Man 69 wrote:

Question. How come in D3 top 35 get all-american but in D1 and D2 it's top 40?

To keep D3 kids whiny.