How old is too old to race in a collegiate/open 5,000m

Who the heck cares about age? If it's an Open meet then it's Open, go run. I watched a Master's runner go sub-30 in an open college 10K. Next year at age 28 I went sub-31 and was 3rd. Nothing wrong with that. College guys have tons of competitive races. If you are a truly fast 30-40-something, unless you run the collegiate Open races, you will never, EVER face competition on the track.

I'm in Oregon too. Ill probably run that meet and a few others between March and May as long as I know I can run at least 4:15 or 16:20, but hopefully 4:08 and 15:50.

Wait till about February/March and you should be able to sign up for them on

www.directathletics.com

andicamp wrote:

Jimmy21 wrote:

I found a meet i want to do. Im hoping to break 16 in the spring but it may be unrealistic and i might do like 16:20. This meet looks perfect

https://m.tfrrs.org/results/47230.html#event_3075536

How do i go about getting in to it?

Wait until registration opens and then register. There's nothing tricky about it. Some meets will have qualifying times, some won't.

The host school typically has a home meet info page on their website, but you probably won't find it 6 months before the meet.

Lewis & Clark, Pacific, Linfield, WOU and Willamette all have outdoor home meets, and at least some of them will allow open athletes.

I emailed the coach

Hi, my name is Jimmy21 and I am a local distance runner. I am interested in running unattached in some of your track meets. I am specifically interested in running the 5,000 in the Jenn Boyman memorial invitational. I would expect to finish in the low 16 minute range. Please let me know if this is possible.

Thank you -Jimmy

Here's the response back

Jimmy, that's no problem. All our meets will be posted on direct athletics. You can register there. Please invite all your friends not on a team to join you.

Mike

It doesnt sound like they are too concerned about keeping it exclusive

I've done some of the Oregon college meets- the D3 & community college ones. A lot of the smaller D1 schools send their athletes to some of these. You just register on Direct Athletics. Nobody gives you a hard time. I've been in races where a 40 year old drops a 15:30 or better and nearly wins the damn thing. Check out the Willamette Opener and Willamette Invite. The Invite has time standards so if you hit it you could get into a quick race.

Go for it!

I'm 30 and slow. The last couple of years I've jumped into the local college XC open.

Its been fun to run XC again and get smoked.

One year only D1 schools showed up and I was almost DFL, thanks to another open runner who was like 50, I was not lol.

This year there was a mix of D1 and even D3 schools, I finished middle of the pack, and it was fun. I wish more open athlete did college XC open races.

Perhaps off topic a bit, but it seems crazy that you can't find a local 5k that goes in 15:xx. I live in a small state and we probably have 50 road 5k's that have at least a few guys finishing between 14:50 and 16:15. You'd usually need to find a race with fewer than 100 runners or so to see a winning time in the 17's. There is the occasional 200-250 runner 5k that is won in 18:xx but those are rare.

We have 5 or 6 big races every year that have at least 15 runners under 16:30. Is that not normal elsewhere?

Guysurpised wrote:

Perhaps off topic a bit, but it seems crazy that you can't find a local 5k that goes in 15:xx. I live in a small state and we probably have 50 road 5k's that have at least a few guys finishing between 14:50 and 16:15. You'd usually need to find a race with fewer than 100 runners or so to see a winning time in the 17's. There is the occasional 200-250 runner 5k that is won in 18:xx but those are rare.

We have 5 or 6 big races every year that have at least 15 runners under 16:30. Is that not normal elsewhere?

Do you live in Illinois? and by road race, do you mean HS XC race?

No man's land wrote:

It is very difficult to find a road 5k with the level of competition I am looking for.... especially in the area I live. I want to try to clock a PR in the 5k, so consequently I am starting to consider putting myself in a college track meet (either this indoor season or 2018 outdoor).

How strange would it be to see a balding middle aged guy spiking up in a college meet? It will probably be a D2 or a lower level D1 meet that I consider. Should I go for it and say "who cares what people think.", or should I stick to the roads and try to run solo.

You need to get out of the sticks. This happens all the time where I live/race.

Also...why even ask lol. Noone cares.

Guysurpised wrote:

Perhaps off topic a bit, but it seems crazy that you can't find a local 5k that goes in 15:xx. I live in a small state and we probably have 50 road 5k's that have at least a few guys finishing between 14:50 and 16:15. You'd usually need to find a race with fewer than 100 runners or so to see a winning time in the 17's. There is the occasional 200-250 runner 5k that is won in 18:xx but those are rare.

We have 5 or 6 big races every year that have at least 15 runners under 16:30. Is that not normal elsewhere?

I dont think thats normal for here. Its hard to say becauase there are like a dozen races every weekend that most races are completely watered down. A winning time for most might be anywhere from 16 to 19 but anyone under 20 will probably be running solo. There might be some competitive races mixed in, but its hard to sort through them all. The only 2 road races that i know of are the shamrock runs, which have like 5,000 people in each race and the nike bowerman 5k. Theres also a cross country series that is pretty deep.

KudzuRunner wrote:

He lapped me three times, I believe, but it could have been four.

OMG NOOOOOOO!!!

I would think they would be fine with an unattached runner showing up and paying $10 or so to run in an open XC meet. Its not like there are any variable / incremental costs to them for another runner or a few more. Unlike the local 5K no t-shirt handouts, swag, food cost or age group medals.

I'm 43 and I ran in a collegiate XC 8k last weekend. I had plenty of stare downs from the kids. I held my own throughout the race. Surely I surprised them.

This whole thread is a thinly veiled hair replacement/just for men add??

The coach "Mike" at Linfield, is a very accomplished masters distance runner himself. ;)

"...stare downs from the kids"... even college kids can spot a weirdo a mile away. In ten years of competing with college runners I never had a single awkward moment.

Over_that_hill wrote:

I'm 43 and I ran in a collegiate XC 8k last weekend. I had plenty of stare downs from the kids. I held my own throughout the race. Surely I surprised them.

Rey Del Sol wrote:

"...stare downs from the kids"... even college kids can spot a weirdo a mile away. In ten years of competing with college runners I never had a single awkward moment.

Over_that_hill wrote:

I'm 43 and I ran in a collegiate XC 8k last weekend. I had plenty of stare downs from the kids. I held my own throughout the race. Surely I surprised them.

He probably forgot to say "gobble gobble mfer" at the start and they were looking at him like "any time now."

SMTR wrote:

Flagpole gives Hillary voters a bad name. "Don't hurt the wittle snowflakes' fe-e-wwings, mmmkay?!"

When I was in college in the 70s/80s I would get beat on the roads, and occasionally on the track by some of our very fast gray hairs of the era. I thought it was cool, and I aspired to emulate them. 20 years later I realized that particular dream (though no gray hair), running 400-5000 in D2-type meets almost every weekend in the spring, even incorporating them into road trips. Most of the kids seemed psyched that I was still fit at twice their age. I did trade elbows a few times but that is part of middle distance racing. My girlfriend who I coached also competed and won the fast heats about half the time, so that was very cool.

Has nothing to do with hurting anyone's feelings. There are just things that shouldn't be done after a certain point.

1) Kids over age 10 don't need to be involved in a public Easter Egg hunt.

2) Once you have graduated from college, it's time to stop hanging out with dudes still in college on that campus.

3) Anyone in high school or above should not enter the "fun run" unless you're a parent of a very young kid in the race.

4) Anyone who has graduated from college and has a job should not be going to spring break destinations and partying with the college crowd.

5) Anyone more than a year out of college should not be going to college bars looking for a hookup.

6) Trick or Treat night should be for kids 12 and under.

And the list could go on and on.

Clubber Lang said it best..."don't need no has-been messing in my corner."

Jimmy21 wrote:

Rey Del Sol wrote:

"...stare downs from the kids"... even college kids can spot a weirdo a mile away. In ten years of competing with college runners I never had a single awkward moment.

He probably forgot to say "gobble gobble mfer" at the start and they were looking at him like "any time now."

POTD

In the SF area, the college meets that allow open entries have plenty of entrants who aren't NCAA. It's typical to see local sub-elites or people in the local clubs who once ran in college but still like to compete.

For example the SF distance carnival:

http://www.sfstategators.com/documents/2017/4/1//SFS_Dist_Compiled_Results_2017.htm?id=4578

There are loads of quick times in the men's 5k from non collegiate runners in those results. Hoka Aggies, Strava TC, West Valley TC, Strawberry Canyon TC, and loads of unattached runners are in those results.

My take is if you can compete at that level, then by all means go for it. They allow open entrants for a reason. If meet directors didn't want you there, they'd close the entries. If you aren't able to actually race against your competitors then there's no point and you may as well do a TT since you're running alone anyway. If you're getting lapped you may even be hindering the quality of the race.