How many HS boys broke 9 minutes for 3,200m in 1997 in US

Poster #529 wrote:

If I had to guess, I'd say the entire decade of the 90's there would be way less than 50 people. Maybe closer to 30.

I counted 30 if you count conversions from 2 miles. Feel free to double check and find any corrections.

'90 - 5

'91 - 2

'92 - 1

'93 - 0

'94 - 2

'95 - 4

'96 - 1

'97 - 3

'98 - 3

'99 - 9

rojo wrote:

I was trying to find some lists from the 1990s the other day. I'm pretty sure Track and Field News used to publish list in the back of their magazines, but it doesn't look like they've archived them online.

I wonder what month would have the final US HS list in it. Then maybe try to find it on ebay.

Anyone want to sell me a lifetime of TFN issues? Apparently, they used to bind them at the end of the year which would be nice to have in the LetsRun library.

Some guy is selling 30 years of bound volumes for like $3k. I was thinking more along the lines of "I'll take them off your hands for $100 and pay for shipping."

I don't have a lifetime of them but have them from early 1971 through 2008. They are not bound but are in bankers boxes.

I have strong sentimental ties to them, especially those from the 1970's, but I stopped subscribing a few years ago and, at this point, my wife would love to get them out of our basement.

I don’t think that increased mileage is the only factor in this explosion of sub-9:00 times after a pretty rough 15-20 years, although that has obviously been a huge part of it. There has really been an increase in everything:

More runners out for the team. I regularly see mid-size high schools with 40-50 boys out for cross-country. I was one of 16 guys on my team in high school (graduated in 1997). The big high schools get 80+ of each gender out.

More middle school teams.

More information on training, what other runners are doing, etc.

More high quality, interstate competitions. Again, when I was in high school my team was not allowed to compete out of state. There was a sub-9:20 2-miler in our state who I am almost certain never lost a race his last two years in high school. (Maybe he did if he went to Foot Locker regionals— that would be it). Now that kid would see really good out of state schools at 2-3 regular competitions/year in addition to NXN regionals and possibly Nike track nationals. Back then there were a few lightly attended TAC age-group meets and that was about it.

The one thing I would really like to know is how/why so many kids started coming out for cross-country in the early/mid-2000s.

Jay Johnson wrote:

It would be interesting to have a thread with coaches who have coached for 20-30 years and had success across three decades. I wonder what they've kept and what they've changed re: training. Perhaps more important, do they communicate with kids and parents differently in 2019 than they did in 199 and 2009.

.

Someone who has been coaching since 199 A.D. certainly would be a great resource ;).

I've been coaching at Hughson since the late 90s. Early on, I had success (relative to my small school peers, certainly not on a national stage) with some really high intensity type stuff. In retrospect, I wonder if my teams would have been better or more consistent if I had trained them a little more similarly to what I do today. For instance, a standard workout for our 2 milers was 6 x 800 with a lap jog (which usually took 2:30ish). I'd have boys who could average 2:25-2:26, but not break 10 minutes. My 2003 team put 5 guys in the top 10 at our CC section meet, but we ran flat as a pancake 2 weeks later at state. We never did much tempo running, nor did we do true long runs.

One thing that has remained constant is that we've done CV type of stuff, especially during cross. The CV stuff was mostly intended to be done more at threshold pace (as described by Daniels as Cruise Intervals), but the kids always ended up running them at a pace that is more in line with what Tinman defines as CV. I started having my kids to CV type work because continuous tempo runs are out of the question at 3:00 in the afternoon in the central valley.

Since I've moved to more of a mileage based approach, my teams are deeper, but the top end is about the same. Right now, we're doing 1 LR, 1 CV, 1 Tempo per week. I'm not the distance coach, but we have 11 guys that will likely break 5 this year. This is far more than I've ever had.

I know I don't have the stable of sub 9 guys that Jay was looking for, but I hope that answered some of the questions about training evolution.

I don't have a lifetime of them but have them from early 1971 through 2008. They are not bound but are in bankers boxes.

I have strong sentimental ties to them, especially those from the 1970's, but I stopped subscribing a few years ago and, at this point, my wife would love to get them out of our basement.[/quote]

If you are interested in getting rid of some or all, please let me know and I’ll post my email to arrange.

Thanks

Valentine McKee wrote:

Poster #529 wrote:

If I had to guess, I'd say the entire decade of the 90's there would be way less than 50 people. Maybe closer to 30.

I counted 30 if you count conversions from 2 miles. Feel free to double check and find any corrections.

'90 - 5

'91 - 2

'92 - 1

'93 - 0

'94 - 2

'95 - 4

'96 - 1

'97 - 3

'98 - 3

'99 - 9

The full list goes down to 9:04. Here are the sub 9s from the 90s.

28 8:49.60i Franklin Sanchez LYNN VOKE TECH HS MA '99

32 8:50.29i Andy Powell OLIVER AMES/NO. EASTON MA '99

80 8:55.1+ Mebrahtom Keflezighi San Diago, (8:51.8-3.2k) CA '94

121 8:57.18+ Andy Maris White River, (8:53.78-3.2k) WA '90

131 8:57.63+ Nathan Nutter Corona del Sol, Tempe, (8:54.23-3.2k) AZ '94

138 8:57.?+ Bryan Dameworth (8:53 - 3.2k) '90

139 8:57.?+ Andy Maris (8:53 - 3.2k) '90

143 8:58.05 Ryan Andrus (Oren, UT) -->Wisconsin UT '97

158 8:58.54+ Murad Campbell Overbrook (8:55.43-3200m) NJ '99

162 8:58.84i Jonathon Riley Brookline High School MA '97

167 8:58.80+ Josh Rohatinsky Provo (8:55.69-3200m) UT '99

180 8:59.34+ Augie Escobar Villa Park (8:56.23-3200m) CA '99

186 8:59.57+ David Gurry, Blanchet,Seatle (8:56.18-3.2k) WA '91

192 8:59.77+ Josh Spiker Ventura H.S. (8:56.66-3200m) CA '99

Got it Valentine, 30 would be right for 3200. You went to 3200 m, into the gray area for the 2 mile purists.

I think it is an eye opener for the old timers who seem to remember that every HS stud in the 70s and 80s broke 9 on high mileage.

Holy cow I did not know Andy Powell was that fast in HS. For the era, that was insane, how on earth did he not do better in college under Lannana?

slow poker wrote:

I think it is an eye opener for the old timers who seem to remember that every HS stud in the 70s and 80s broke 9 on high mileage.

Not sure what your point is. Certainly more common now, but up until ca. 2005-10, more kids per year ran under 9 in the 1970s and 80s, compared to 1990s and early 2000s. Quick count on this sheet - about did it 110 in the 70s, and 70 or so in the 80s.

recall wrote:

A better guess wrote:

A better guess is 1 or 2. Maybe 16 kids broke 9 that decade.

From 1990-96 only a handful did it, and we might have had a few years when no one did. Mead HS in Spokane was about the only one producing sub 9 or 9:10 runners on a regular basis. Meb was another standout, running about 8:50-51 in the mid-90s.

Gabe Jennings, Andy Powell, Hall, who was a couple years younger?) kind of broke through in the 1997-99 period.

This site was the standard for a number of years (& glad it's still up), although he got mixed up between 3200 and 2 mile sometimes (converting some 3200 times to 2 miles, while not getting the 2 milers right for a 3200 m conversion).

http://www.cs.uml.edu/~phoffman/nats/gods.htm

your welcome

if you are going to so confidently ask the board to thank you for your detective work, I'd get in the habit of using the correct form of the words you are trying to use.

"you're" welcome.

Poster #529 wrote:

Holy cow I did not know Andy Powell was that fast in HS. For the era, that was insane, how on earth did he not do better in college under Lannana?

He ran 3:39 as a freshmen, but if I recall was pretty consistently injured in later years.

Valentine McKee wrote:

Poster #529 wrote:

If I had to guess, I'd say the entire decade of the 90's there would be way less than 50 people. Maybe closer to 30.

I counted 30 if you count conversions from 2 miles. Feel free to double check and find any corrections.

'90 - 5

'91 - 2

'92 - 1

'93 - 0

'94 - 2

'95 - 4

'96 - 1

'97 - 3

'98 - 3

'99 - 9

Is low mileage really that bad?

Quality over quantity wrote:

Valentine McKee wrote:

I counted 30 if you count conversions from 2 miles. Feel free to double check and find any corrections.

'90 - 5

'91 - 2

'92 - 1

'93 - 0

'94 - 2

'95 - 4

'96 - 1

'97 - 3

'98 - 3

'99 - 9

Is low mileage really that bad?

Meanwhile the Kenyans and Ethiopians were running sub 13 for 5000m.

you must be new here

it's a meme you moran

The point is that the crazy long slow distance crowd from 40 years ago seem to think that kids were faster in the 70s and 80s. I run into people who refuse to believe that is used to be unheard of to have a kid break 9. We have 110 kids in the 70s and 70 in the 80s and then we have 35 in just one year, 2015. Do you even comprehend how we used to have years with only 1 or 2 kids breaking 9 and now we can have 35? In just the tiny state of Iowa in 2014, 3 kids ran sub 9 and another was very close to breaking it. That is more kids than did it in the entire country in many years up until 20 years ago.

I think one of the things folks often forget in statistical analysis is sheer volume. With population growth there are simply more high schoolers over all.

Whether a greater percentage are competing or not, the number goes up. Even with that it would seem that the percentage of sub 9’s is on the rise.

I think a lot of it has to do with the internet and the ability to so freely disseminate information. It’s easy to know what others are up to and use that as a measuring stick. Throw in more opportunities to compete against one another and you start to see how it all accelerates.

Population Growth wrote:

I think one of the things folks often forget in statistical analysis is sheer volume. With population growth there are simply more high schoolers over all.

Whether a greater percentage are competing or not, the number goes up. Even with that it would seem that the percentage of sub 9’s is on the rise.

I think a lot of it has to do with the internet and the ability to so freely disseminate information. It’s easy to know what others are up to and use that as a measuring stick. Throw in more opportunities to compete against one another and you start to see how it all accelerates.

This is not a satisfying explanation, because the number went down from the 1970s to the 1990s even as the population rose. Additional population growth since the 90s may be a factor but it certainly isn’t sufficient, otherwise you’d see linear increases in these numbers over time instead of a big dip 25ish years ago.

A great example is the long jump, and it’s not just an American thing. You’d think that as world population grows and more and more countries increase their standard of living, you’d see an increase in quality long jumpers. Instead, that event is still stuck in its 1990s peak. Only one of the all-time top 10 marks is from the 2010s (it’s number 10) and that mark is almost a foot short of the world record.

That also interesting because I think the men’s long jump is probably one of the events in which doping is least helpful. (I’m not saying it isn’t helpful, just that it’s least helpful). Make of that what you will.

I can still remember toeing the line at Stanford XC in 1999 hearing my name and one of the top returning 3200m runners in the country. I ran 9:19 as a Sophomore the year prior. Now it would take an 8:54 to even be mentioned.