Utah State Meet - 33 under 16:00, 3 under 15:00 at 4,260'

Coached Fitness Blogger wrote:

moist wrote:

And here I hoped you were capable of intelligent conversation.

Bullsh*t. That's why you led with the declaration that I was some mountain kid reaching up my ass for an overly generous conversion factor. Clearly, if were to communicate with utmost intelligence here, the conversation would be one-sided anyway.

How's this? 33 kids broke 16:00, straight up. 84 did so with the conversion I used per the NCAA. If you think it should be somewhere in the middle based on lifelong high-altitude residence, great, so the number may be closer to 50. If you cannot understand that the essential point is not the exact number of kids who can break 16:00 from Utah but the impressive depth of the talent there, maybe you've spend to much time at the low intellectual altitude of Letsrun.

If you compare to WA state (harder course than UT), you have the following:

WA = 5k

UT = 3 mi

Linear sub-16 conversion for WA = 16:32 cutoff

2016 WA state sub-16:32s: 114

2017 UT state sub-16:00s: 50 assuming moderated NCAA conversion

WA population: 7.288 million

UT population: 3.050 million

Rate of sub-16 equivalents:

WA: 1 per 63930

UT: 1 per 61000

Congrats. Utah might be slightly deeper than Washington on UT's easier course. But considering most of the talent in WA is in the east side, you're not as good as them.

Sounds like someone has sour grapes. What empirical evidence do you have to support your claim? I can think of more than enough going the other way. Look at CU's track records as an example. Most were set when the Buffs hosted the 2008 Big 12 championships (because Colorado distance athletes rarely run track races at altitude as it is easier to get a national qualifying time at low altitude as the conversion is typically not enough). Manzano ran 3:41.8 which converts to 3:36.51. In Beijing that year he ran 3:36.67 (It's safe to say the conversion is pretty accurate). In the steeple chase, Billy Nelson ran 8:53.84, which converts to 8:39.38. At the OTs that year he ran 8:21.47. Vaughn ran 14:13.99 in the 5000, which converts to 13:49.17. Earlier that year he ran 13:18.46 at Stanford. There is my evidence, where is yours (other than what your gut tells you)?

As a lifelong WA runner, your "analysis" is quite sad. Just stop.

At the top end, WA right now is nowhere near UT. And your last sentence makes no sense whatsoever.

It is impossible to compare cross country times across state lines (other than races like Foot Locker and NXN). College races are another matter entirely. Do your same analysis on Dellinger or Pre-Nats and tell us how things look.

But if you look at the 3200 numbers you get a better idea of what's going on. Washington had 31 boys go under 9:30 last spring. Utah had 29 under 9:30. And it would be a lot more if it was lower elevation like WA. So WA has well over twice the population, and basically the same level of talent. So the Utah boys are more than twice as talented as the WA boys.

It's pretty obvious most people on here don't realize how incredible the competition is on the Utah boy's side. I live in Arizona and have seen it on display at the Nike Southwest meet the last few years. It's pretty humbling.

Utah has a population of 3 million. It's in a region with a population of 21 million. Colorado and Arizona are more than twice the size. The last 2 years Utah has had 11 out of the top 20 runners in the championship meet. Hugely disproportionate for a tiny state. This meet generally sees all of the top talent attending from the region, so it's not like top runners from other states aren't showing up. They are all running and getting beat by these Utah kids.

At the SW meet there is a little side competition every year where they calculate the scores of the top 5 from each state. Utah has won every single year since Nike started this meet. Pound for pound it's obvious this tiny little state isolated in the intermountain west is a powerhouse for boys cross country.

If you look at that Utah state course, it looks pretty tough. It's very hilly and at altitude. The average time from that state meet(3 miles) ends up being about the same speed as the 5K at the Southwest meet here in AZ(last year was an exception because of the strong winds at the Southwest meet). That's a 30 second handicap. That state course is obviously very slow.

Yikes, these momos have gotten angrier of late. I heard they're selling caffeinated soda on BYU campus now... must be the associated 'roid rage.

moist wrote:

6.5/10 for moist. Quality troll job on display. Anytime you see Mormons lose their sh*t it's pretty entertaining.

Coached Fitness Blogger wrote:

How's this? 33 kids broke 16:00, straight up.

Broke 16 ON A CROSS COUNTRY COURSE. Might as well be a triathlon run leg.

Stop caring about times in XC!

(Hell stop caring about times for everything and worry about racing)

runnER/DR wrote:

But if you look at the 3200 numbers you get a better idea of what's going on. Washington had 31 boys go under 9:30 last spring. Utah had 29 under 9:30. And it would be a lot more if it was lower elevation like WA. So WA has well over twice the population, and basically the same level of talent. So the Utah boys are more than twice as talented as the WA boys.

17 of those Utah boys got their PR at Arcadia versus 6 from Washington picking up their PR at Arcadia.

For the record, 140 boys from CA broke 9:30

It is 13 times the size of Utah. 5 Times the size of Washington. Relative to population Washington would be similarly competitive to California(although probably slightly better). Utah is markedly more competitive relative to its size.

As long as we are comparing UT and WA (I am from WA but spend time in UT), here is my list of distance Olympians (men) from each state since 1970 (feel free to add):

WA: Kardong, Barquist

UT: Padilla, Marsh, Eyestone, Ward,

Utah has about 650,000 high school students. California has about 1,700,000.

When you look at the demographic of cross country in general, it's suburban white kids whose household income is above the national average.

With that in mind, Utah has about 649,997 high school students in that category. California has about 600,000.

Utah is clearly underperforming!

YMMV wrote:

distance Olympians (men) from each state since 1970 (feel free to add):

d,

Didn't want to include Gerry?

This thread is my happy place

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, there are 4.5 million high school students in Cali, 410K in Utah. So only 11 times as many high school students in Utah.

But it is definitely true that Utah is overwhelmingly white and affluent, the key distance running demographic in the US. I'm sure this is one reason they have done well.

That's an early state meet wrote:

The what you say? wrote:

Damn, we have league finals in 2 weeks and these kids are done.

Have to. Snow starts mid/late October in many places.

California department of education disagrees and a little bit of logic might help here too. There are just over 1500 high schools that are a part of CIF. So you're saying the average high school in CA has about 3,000 students?

https://www.cde.ca.gov/ds/sd/cb/ceffingertipfacts.asp