Can anyone run college xc these days?

oldtimertime wrote:

You'd be better served having the basketball team show up and race.

That is *exactly* the case at some colleges, particularly on the women's side. The basketball coach is also the cross-country coach. S/he lines up the required minimum number of meets; uses the xc season for preseason basketball conditioning; and concludes the xc season before the first allowable day of bball practice.

Under NCAA rules colleges have to sponsor a minimum number of teams. Handling things this way allows a college to add a (relatively) inexpensive sport to the sponsored list, and then get it out of the way so the focus can be on what's important, roundball.

I just don't get why more Athletic Directors don't care about fielding a competitive team in every sport. I know Syracuse is an anomaly, not all programs are going to go from zero to hero, but you would think more programs would at least try. I mean looking at some of these results, there are several high schools in each area that could beat these teams. It's especially sad to see Division 1 programs that are that bad. If you can offer any kind of money, it shouldn't be too hard to attract a kid or 2 that wants to work hard and be good.

"Yeah, this older timer is out of touch and delusional about the glory days, "

I don't think older timer was saying things were faster in the front back in his day. He's saying things were not as slow in the rear.

Being an old timer myself. I concur.

There are far more sub 25 guys today (and sub-24). There are far more 28+ guys today. I'd also say there are fewer 25-26 minute guys today.

Back in my day (the 70's and early 80's), there were a few runners at the top (and we ran more 10k back then, just a few 8ks) running 24-25 for 8k or high 29's low 30's for 10k. Then a larger pack from 25-26 (or 31-32 10k), then it started stretching out. By 28 (35 10k)you just had a few stragglers. Most of whom were just having a back day. I don't remember anyone on my teams running slower than 29 8k. Ever.

Today it seems like there there's a bigger pack sub 25. Then is starts stretching out all the way to 30+.

So, yea, kids are faster today. And there are more faster runners.

There are also more slower runners - they just could not or would not make the team back in "the day".

I don't think there are more runners today. It's about the same. At least at the college level (and there were more schools with a program. Since almost every school had one.

What are the arguments against a cut off time at a college meet? I understand not having them in high school, but why not in college? It would make the meet go by so much faster, and it would make your invitational look better. Who wants to race at a meet where a dozen scrubs are basically walking it in? Hard to take a sport seriously when virtually anyone who wants to can compete can go to the right meets and race alongside nationally ranked teams. More impressive to watch when even the people getting last are still respectable runners.

[quote]Hounddogharrier wrote:

For a lot of college having fast kids on the xc team is not the administrative reason for having the team. The 3 main reasons are as follows:

1. To be in the NCAA . A college that isn't in the NCAA is looked upon by applicants as not a real college. You need to have 7 sports men and women to be in the NCAA. For a lot of small college, xc is a real cheap way to knock off 1 sport . Pay some administrator $1,000 to coach the team, go to 3 invitationals, the league championships and get killed at regionals and mission accomplished.

2. Title IX compliant. If a school has a football team , you are going to need a bunch of girls on sports to offset it. That's why so many fat chicks are on college cross-country teams.

3. Kids love to say they are on a college team and they will pay tuition to go to your school if you have one. It's a pretty good deal for a college to get $30,000 in tuition and in return let a kid wear a uniform , ride the bus to 4 or 5 meets and run with a couple hundred others kids.[/quot

My daughter is currently in the process of choosing a college and receives a blizzard of communication from small schools. She is not a track or CC star. She has told me that D3 schools must accept all females who want to run cross country.

I'm not sure whether that holds for track and field. Some of the absolute slowest graduates of her high school cross country program are at this moment running D3 cross country having high school PR's of 24 to 25 minutes for the 5k.

I think some of the women's sports in D3 are used to comply with Orwellian Title IX and to simply put paying butts in the classrooms.

A 31 minute 8k won runner of the week in the SLIAC this week... like that is unfathomable to me.

I ran in D3, I saw a lot of this nonsense. In a way the super-slow girls in our conference actually became "known" in sort of a parodic version of the way that the studs in the conference became mini-celebrities to us. We'd breathe a sigh of relief whenever we saw these trundling celebs line up for the 800, and groan when we'd see them warming up before the 10K. I get that in D3 there usually aren't cuts, but when you reach a certain level of non-ability, the coach at least has the right to say, "Allie, on this team you're an 800 runner. If you want to run 10Ks, there are road races every Saturday."

[quote]

I ran in D3, I saw a lot of this nonsense. In a way the super-slow girls in our conference actually became "known" in sort of a parodic version of the way that the studs in the conference became mini-celebrities to us. We'd breathe a sigh of relief whenever we saw these trundling celebs line up for the 800, and groan when we'd see them warming up before the 10K."

Bump. This is literary gold

at our school we are just happy to have 5 runners on the team. We focus on individual improvement throughout the season...and yes, some of them are still running 10 min miles. But heck, they don't give up and that's what matters in my book. Of course we are not giving out scholarships and competing at high levels....so there's that

Anyone can run xc and that has always been the case. There are coaches willing to let anyone willing to work hard, or even any able body at all, walk on a bottom of the barrel team. This has been the case pretty much forever, the internet just allows you to notice it. If you have your heart set on running in college and don't care about how strong your school's academic reputation is, you can do it.

Kvothe wrote:

Anyone can run xc and that has always been the case. There are coaches willing to let anyone willing to work hard, or even any able body at all, walk on a bottom of the barrel team. This has been the case pretty much forever, the internet just allows you to notice it. If you have your heart set on running in college and don't care about how strong your school's academic reputation is, you can do it.

Anyone can participate in high school XC. Basketball, baseball, golf & wrestling coaches may tell their athletes not participating in a fall sport to join XC team. The results may be ugly. O.P. was referring to college XC since he was referring to 8K XC. Track & field coach may want 400m athlete or 400/800 athlete to participate in college XC. Those results are not always great by 400 &/or 800 gals &/or guys, XC.

................................and people wonder why there is no interest in Track & Field.