Oregon state meet is completely watered down. Six divisions!!
These kids going to state wouldn't make it out of most leagues. Tack on the silliness of 1500m and 3000m. It's all for these small private schools to claim state champ trophies.
Oregon should move to league, region, then a single state meet. No divisions. For a state that claims to be the epicenter of running, you're not. You crown a 225 800m gal as a champion.
yes, Oregon is too woke and the state meet is a joke, 6 divisions, everybody gets a medal.
Actually, on second thought here are 2 possible solutions:
1. Teams are allowed to chase marks at verified invitationals during the season. At the end of the season, the top 9 or however many for distance events and field events are given a spot at the state meet. Gives people an entire season to get marks, it gets rid of rounds, and it keeps the one day state meet in Texas. Obviously the downside is that running rounds is one of the most important parts of the postseason in this sport, in my opinion. It REALLY shows who is the best.
2. Make a similar league/section/state system to California, or keep the current district/area/regional system in Texas, but with one major difference: add at-large marks to each level of qualification, and add a preliminary day at the state meet. The preliminary day could even be the week before states so that it wouldn't effect the quality of the meet - obviously the downside here is that it adds an extra meet of high level competition.
I love the idea of Point #2, Texas would be perfect for leagues/sections etc.
If anything, Cali could probably use less rounds because at least in my section which is SJS, you have to go through 8 entire rounds, 2 per week for almost the entirety of May.
I'd love for the state meet prelims/finals to be a week apart, but that's probably never gonna happen. Cali is too big for stuff like that.
Actually, on second thought here are 2 possible solutions:
1. Teams are allowed to chase marks at verified invitationals during the season. At the end of the season, the top 9 or however many for distance events and field events are given a spot at the state meet. Gives people an entire season to get marks, it gets rid of rounds, and it keeps the one day state meet in Texas. Obviously the downside is that running rounds is one of the most important parts of the postseason in this sport, in my opinion. It REALLY shows who is the best.
2. Make a similar league/section/state system to California, or keep the current district/area/regional system in Texas, but with one major difference: add at-large marks to each level of qualification, and add a preliminary day at the state meet. The preliminary day could even be the week before states so that it wouldn't effect the quality of the meet - obviously the downside here is that it adds an extra meet of high level competition.
I love the idea of Point #2, Texas would be perfect for leagues/sections etc.
If anything, Cali could probably use less rounds because at least in my section which is SJS, you have to go through 8 entire rounds, 2 per week for almost the entirety of May.
I'd love for the state meet prelims/finals to be a week apart, but that's probably never gonna happen. Cali is too big for stuff like that.
8 rounds for SJ section but you can get away with slower times Southern Section has 7 rounds but you are required to run very fast as soon as prelims to move on - round 3. If your in a competitive league you may have to starting running fast at league finals. Micah Grossman barely qualified out of league finals and he went 4:06 at cif finals. That league with San Clemente and Dana hills was brutal lots of fast runners were eliminated at round 2.
8 rounds for SJ section but you can get away with slower times Southern Section has 7 rounds but you are required to run very fast as soon as prelims to move on - round 3. If your in a competitive league you may have to starting running fast at league finals. Micah Grossman barely qualified out of league finals and he went 4:06 at cif finals. That league with San Clemente and Dana hills was brutal lots of fast runners were eliminated at round 2.
That's a really good point actually. SJS you can literally jog your way to state, but Southern Section is so absurdly competitive I'd almost say it's unfair. It's also a big reason why so many amazing athletes get so burnt out by state and perform like crap.
I was on another thread discussing how the CA sections need to be revamped, specifically the SS and the SF/Oakland sections. The SS could be broken up to like at least 3 separate sections by itself, with SF and Oakland being integrated into CCS.
Running a 4:04 at a DIVISONAL championship is just ridiculous. That could be saved for state.
it sounds fun but it's exhausting. There are 8 qualifying rounds in California. You couldn't get past the 4th round unless you ran a 4:10. If you ran a 4:11, you are out.
Just 1 bad day you can't move on. Just 1 sick day or slight injury and your season is over. When it's all done and over, you will probably be too burnt out to do any other meets after the state meet.
I've made this point before, that although Cal has a grueling process, kids in the Northeast are still running meets all these weekends in a row anyway.
Each state is a bit different but it basically goes Penn Relays, league meet, county meet, regional meet, state meet, meet of champions. Then on to national meets.
They are not all qualifiers for the next round, but you still have to compete in them. So it's a similar gauntlet of races 6-8 straight weekends.
CA doesn't just have the qualifying meets in the weeks leading up to the state meet but most events have a prelim the day before the state final. It makes it almost impossible to triple in distance events, even though there is no prelim for the 3200.
I've made this point before, that although Cal has a grueling process, kids in the Northeast are still running meets all these weekends in a row anyway.
Each state is a bit different but it basically goes Penn Relays, league meet, county meet, regional meet, state meet, meet of champions. Then on to national meets.
They are not all qualifiers for the next round, but you still have to compete in them. So it's a similar gauntlet of races 6-8 straight weekends.
CA doesn't just have the qualifying meets in the weeks leading up to the state meet but most events have a prelim the day before the state final. It makes it almost impossible to triple in distance events, even though there is no prelim for the 3200.
True, but the prelim day is what makes a single division state meet possible. It would be impossible to differentiate who is is better across the state without actually having them race against each other because of the varying conditions that each athlete runs their qualifying section finals race in.
I love the idea of Point #2, Texas would be perfect for leagues/sections etc.
If anything, Cali could probably use less rounds because at least in my section which is SJS, you have to go through 8 entire rounds, 2 per week for almost the entirety of May.
I'd love for the state meet prelims/finals to be a week apart, but that's probably never gonna happen. Cali is too big for stuff like that.
8 rounds for SJ section but you can get away with slower times Southern Section has 7 rounds but you are required to run very fast as soon as prelims to move on - round 3. If your in a competitive league you may have to starting running fast at league finals. Micah Grossman barely qualified out of league finals and he went 4:06 at cif finals. That league with San Clemente and Dana hills was brutal lots of fast runners were eliminated at round 2.
SJ needs less rounds. No reason why it needs so many rounds.
Southern section just needs to be broken up. There is no other solution. If you add at-large standards to some of the league and divisional meets then EVERYONE is gonna move on and you won't be able to filter out athletes. The masters mile field is gonna have 40 people.
The entirety of Texas competing at one state meet would make for one hell of a race.
Albeit, would probably be ridiculously hard to even qualify for.
#1 - Texas state meet has national records broken all the time as is.
#2 - Track & Field is a team sport. It's a big deal for a 1A or 2A school to show up to Austin, with pretty much the entire population of their community there to watch, and compete for a state title. A school with 100 kids, or 500 kids, or even a 1000 kids is never going to score as many points as a school with 5000+ kids.
Massachusetts went from a scored state meet to an MOC a few years back and it’s been great. The Division (by school size) is still scored but at the MOC everyone runs their best event.
Connecticut has “class meets” (a state meet by school size) and the top X advance to the State Open (essentially a MOC) the following week. They’ve got this in XC, indoor and out and I think it’s great. That said, the Open is team scored so we have a true team champ as well as true state individual champs.
None of the serious athletes consider themselves a “state champ” if they win their class meet, but some of the small schools people do. It’s all about the Open.
theres also New England’s the following week where the top 6 per event compete against the top 6 from the other 5 states in New eng. New England XC in particular is a great championship meet.