People should focus less on high school records and maybe rather have their eyes set on the international stage. Hs records are more or less worthless.
This is why they went to these and not cif. Means more than state at this point.
But it also proves the contention that they have advantages that other high school runners don’t have. 99.9 percent of high schoolers have their race schedule set by an athletic director who is scheduling softball and golf at the same time. Yes it would be pointless for them to race in local meets every week, and it is great that they have opportunities beyond that. They are raising the bar on how to be successful as high school age runners, but they also have advantages that few other runners could get.
The reality is not that they were given some special advantage that is unfairly due. They ran times that would allow them into those races and they showed up. We have seen top High School kids from Webb to Kessler to now Salhman and Young get these chances. It maybe a little more common then in Webb's day, but the local kids in their league are not getting this chance because frankly they cannot run in these races. For them, trying to win CIF Sections and State is more reasonable. For NP kids, getting into races that pull them to these times makes sense. #2 All time HS and #1 Junior 5K in my opinion we would prefer achieving in High School than winning State 3200 in CA or my team winning State Track Title.
When you're way below the high school records, they are a great target to aim at for several years. When you get close to them, they should be more of a floor than a ceiling. Now they can look next year for Leo, Lex, and Aaron to national under 20 records. 13:20 may be in play next year if everything goes right. It's just the beginning. Look at Nico Young, now at 13:11 after 13:50 in high school. Even he has a few stages to go (to Abdi's level, then to True and Hassan, then to BK, then Solinsky, Fisher, and Lagat, then under that junior record, etc.) before he can have the ambition of running even close to the world junior record and he's already too old for that. Starting out with the ambition of beating Cheptegei's not going to work.
This is why they went to these and not cif. Means more than state at this point.
But it also proves the contention that they have advantages that other high school runners don’t have. 99.9 percent of high schoolers have their race schedule set by an athletic director who is scheduling softball and golf at the same time. Yes it would be pointless for them to race in local meets every week, and it is great that they have opportunities beyond that. They are raising the bar on how to be successful as high school age runners, but they also have advantages that few other runners could get.
Their advantage is that they’re fast enough to get to the starting line in open races. Many HS runners have done the same thing. Chapa’s legendary 28:32, Webb’s 3:53 and Nelson’s 8:36 were all run in open races.
This is why they went to these and not cif. Means more than state at this point.
But it also proves the contention that they have advantages that other high school runners don’t have. 99.9 percent of high schoolers have their race schedule set by an athletic director who is scheduling softball and golf at the same time.
Huh? Coaches decide where they take their team for the fast races, not anybody else. Athletic Directors just schedule the league meets.
89 steps wrote: 99.9 percent of high schoolers have their race schedule set by an athletic director who is scheduling softball and golf at the same time.
Huh? Coaches decide where they take their team for the fast races, not anybody else. Athletic Directors just schedule the league meets.