XC will soon be everyone racing on Treadmills to make it fair for everyone, with giant safety pits filled with rubber padding in case any falls off the back of their treadmill.
XC will soon be everyone racing on Treadmills to make it fair for everyone, with giant safety pits filled with rubber padding in case any falls off the back of their treadmill.
Boots on the ground here, just did a walk-through of the course with my roommate. The problem is definitely the ice and not the snow. There is much less than nine inches of snow on the ground right now, probably closer to two or three. But the parts of the course that were clear of snow are very swampy, and froze over last night, creating very large and uneven chunks of ice. There were several 10-30m segments that were predominantly ice patches. The area near the start is the worst, which is an obvious problem because it's pretty hard to keep track of your footing in a crowd of 200+ other runners. UB made a commendable effort to clear the course, but it seemed like the use of the Gator probably made conditions a little bit worse, creating ruts that filled in with water and then froze. I ran this course in 2011 in howling winds (30-40mph, if memory serves), and would take those conditions over these ones every time. Definitely not a safe course for the athletes.
I was told by someone cleaning up the flags and cones that the road course is being figured out right now, and will probably be on the UB North campus, adjacent to the golf course. There are some bike trails and small wooded sections on the campus, but he seemed doubtful that those would be utilized. There are also tens of thousands of kids on that campus who all have class tomorrow so that's an interesting dilemma...
Here are the courses!
Where is the Sea Ice wrote:
You clearly don’t understand the difference between overall climate and weather (they are actually 2 different things). I see the impact of climate change everyday, as I currently live in Alaska. We have only had 0.2 inches of snow so far for the season in Anchorage. We have been getting a little less snow each year that I’ve lived here and it is getting kind of ridiculous. The bears are not even in hibernation yet because there is NO snow on the ground. The diminishing sea ice in AK is causing the Arctic front to get pushed downwards to the lower 48, hence why everyone else has snow.
So are you living sustainably up in Alaska? Last I checked, Alaska had the 4th highest per capita CO2 production of any US state making it one of the most energy intensive places to live on the planet, so pardon me if I find it ironic that an Alaskan is complaining about manmade climate change. They have quite a bit of hydro for electricity, but almost all of their food (other than seafood and berries) is shipped in along with a large segment of the economy is based on tourism which involves flying in people from great distances and burning a bunch of fuel on boats so that people can stare at bears and glaciers.
all Syracuse runners have either Next% of Zoom Fly 3 as of this morning
Remember guys! If you have ANY information ever, make sure to email the UMass Lowell coach before you post it on Twitter, otherwise you'll be called pathetic!
rojo wrote:
wtfrojo wrote:
Thank god you waited to contribute to the conversation until you found all this out. Oh wait, your post complaining about how this is a disgrace is still up on page 1....
So you want me to erase history? I said in the first post that I was outraged they'd move the course to the road based on the photos I saw. I then asked if anyone in Buffalo could talk to me to tell me if it was dangerous. I then heard from those people and am saying it's the right call.
Would just like you to maybe wait until you know whats actually going on before complaining and adding fuel to the fire on the wrong side of the story.
oldmanwinter wrote:
Kids are getting as soft as snowflakes. 8 inches of snow in Buffalo is nothing. Now if there was 5+ feet from a lake effect storm, then they should consider switching to a road race, but 8 inches is nothing. My senior year of college our regional meet was in about 6 inches of snow. Everybody is running in the same conditions, so why does it matter. If it's that big a deal just plow the course.
It always cracks me up to read old farts saying, and I paraphrase, "I was tough, and the rest of my generation was tough. We ran in the snow. We only got trophies if we won something...Kids today are soft little weaklings who will only run if conditions are perfect, and they expect participation trophies for getting last place, blah blah blah..."
But who are the people deciding the kids can't run in certain conditions? Not the kids themselves; it's the generations above them, i.e., YOU, you old fart!! Who decides to hand out participation trophies to everybody remotely associated with an event? Not the kids - it's the old farts again! The "tough, rugged, no-nonsense" old farts make decisions for the kids that cast them in a wimpy light, and then blame the kids for not being as tough as they like to pretend they once were.
Captain Literally wrote:
In the most literal sense possible, yes, the snowflakes won.
It's a solid double entendre. Rojo is too dense have done it intentionally with his #OkBoomer edit.
You literally know nothing. This whole process has been chaos with the Idiots over USTFCCCA more interested in their Twitter ratio than actually informing the coaches where the NCAA DIVISION 1 CROSS COUNTRY REGIONAL race is going to be held. Teams have been sitting around all day waiting for word from them because they said they would email and new information and coaches are having to check Twitter to confirm stuff. unacceptable! Credit him for standing up for the rest of the coaches in the region.
I don't see any snow on the ground. Why don't they just run on the grass?
XC_Dad wrote:
Leaked Course Map
https://twitter.com/dad_xc/status/1194990218342027266?s=21
OKay folks. The problem here is that they plowed the course. If they didn't plow it then would of limited the ice formation. I know as I'm a northerner myself... problems mostly arise from plowing. (Captain Hindsight 2020) Yes the times would of been ridiculously slow... sure maybe a runner or two would gotten hurt but so what. It's XC.
If they were hell bent on having it on the roads due to safety... they should of moved the race back to Saturday or Sunday afternoon to give teams time to collect the necessary gear to make this a fair race.
Found the UMass Lowell coach...
Given that the USTFCCCA was probably notified as soon as Buffalo figured something out. They probably posted to get the info out asap. Geez, find something else to be mad about.
This whole thing is just classic.
Old people decide to have a November xc race in Buffalo.
Decision proves disastrous
Old people then blame "kids these days".
Last I checked, my last paycheck was not from UMass but that’s a nice compliment.
Cross country is great because most of the season's races are run in nice weather on courses in good condition and then Regionals / Nationals is 2,000 meter longer and the weather is really lousy...unlike any conditions beforehand, both for races and training.
Makes a lot of sense [sarcasm font]
you ran the course 8 years ago and you still have a roommate today?!
Bonkers wrote:
This whole thing is just classic.
Old people decide to have a November xc race in Buffalo.
Decision proves disastrous
Old people then blame "kids these days".
Who hosts the meet is not up to the old people at the USTFCCCA. Coaches have to put in bids to host. Buffalo coach is the only coach putting in bids.
If other coaches have a problem going to Buffalo, they can volunteer to host the meet.
Get Real Brah wrote:
oldmanwinter wrote:
Kids are getting as soft as snowflakes. 8 inches of snow in Buffalo is nothing. Now if there was 5+ feet from a lake effect storm, then they should consider switching to a road race, but 8 inches is nothing. My senior year of college our regional meet was in about 6 inches of snow. Everybody is running in the same conditions, so why does it matter. If it's that big a deal just plow the course.
And your regional meet course was uphill the entire way, right gramps?
Uphill both ways. There were a couple of car wrecks on our way to the meet so we had to get out and run to the venue. People were crossing the line with snot frozen to there faces, snow laden eyebrows and moustaches and blue skin. I ran it with a beer in each hand and a coed on my back. And we liked it dang it, we loved it.
Not surprised. The northeast is for wimpy hillary lovers.