The King of Controversy

I 10000% agree. It's like this in every division pretty much everywhere, even here across the country in NC. Why should it have anything to do with equality in geography, it shouldn't be by region - the fastest people in the state should be the ones competing for a state title. Who cares if more of those come from one part of the state than another?

I know. My region is like 1000 times better than the other region and they get to qualify the same amount of people at their region meet as we do. That's so stupid. A lot of great runners from my region get left out every year when guys who are really nothing more than JV quality athletes get to run at state. I thought State was supposed to be prestigious.

It's an imperfect system for sure. It does a lousy job of keeping some guys who shouldn't be running at state out. But it does a fairly good job of making sure that everyone who has a reasonable chance of scoring a point at state is invited.

You do need some placing mechanism in place to 1) at least let the other regions feel involved 2) reward the guy who runs well vs. his competition, but not necessarily against the clock. The schools up north will be quick to point out that some regions race at Park City or other higher altitude locations vs. the region 9 schools that typically compete at mostly lower altitudes--thus you can't just go purely off of times.

same goes for 5A, especially region 2. A few guys qualified with a 4:53 and 10:35, with the qualifying times at 4:24 and 9:36!

Holy crap! I thought it was bad enough with a 3A guy qualifying with a 4:48 when the qualifying time was 4:32.

My opinion is to get rid of all classes (ie - go to a single-class system). Utah is way too small (unpopulated) to break up into 4 or 5 classes or whatever it is. We have the same problem here in Colorado. Back in Indiana where I grew up, we had no classes, and the top 3 in each region made it state (9 regions total). No exceptions. So big schools completed directly against little schools, and it was quite an honor just to make it to state...definitely no 4:45 guys.

When I was in HS in New York, there were 4 classes of school sizes (ABCD). We had a regional state qualifier meet about 10 days before states. The top athlete in each class at regionals would advance to states, plus one "at large" provided they were under a time (I remember it being around 4:24 for the 1600).

I just looked up NY's current method (I'm old now and wondered if it had changed). Now they just have two classes - big and small schools, and 11 regions. Top athlete from each class goes to states, plus just one at large if they hit the standard (which is 4:17.1 for the 1600!). Simple method. Making states is really tough in NY.

I would agree that having 5 classes in a state of 3 million people is a little too much, if a state w/ 20 million people only has 2 classes, for an individual sport like track. NY still does the ABCD 4 class system for cross country, where bigger schools have an advantage.

what they should do is totally take away the 4 spots at region, and relax the times by a few seconds.

I think they should keep it the way it is, but have a minimum mark that those qualifying through region placing have to have run during the season. like a 10:00 in the 3200, or a 4:35 in the mile.

I also like how they do it in indoor NCAA's where they just take the top 16 times, and altitude convert them if they have too.

My teammate ran a 9:38, but isn't going to state in the 3200, and there are guys over 10:30 who are! it is a tad ridiculous.

I agree a little with everybody. I get what you are saying galen but ya dude if there are fricking guys who run a 10:30 and there are probably 50 guys around the state that are faster than that he shouldn't be running at state.

I like how the colleges do it. Top whatever places, it makes it more fair. Especially when me, casey clinger, mckay johns, zac jacklin, and galen didn't run the 2mile because we were already qualified, so the person that got 4th, really isn't the 4th fastest guy in the region.

Maybe make region more important so guys run at it. But i would like 2 weeks between region and state for recovery

Spencer smith is right. 4:53 and 10:30. There are so many other guys faster than that!

When I was in high school back in the 60s, we never worried about this stuff. Just lace up the kangaroo skin spikes and wail on brother….wail on!!!

Just run a 4:04 and don't worry about it.

I think Cassidy's got the right idea.

Quintus, that is the best idea so far

I agree with Hell Raiser. Props to Quintus.

Hey just run faster and qualify by time. Life is unfair, if you live in a fast region then you have to work harder to state qualify. The slow guys who make it to the state meet by region placing arent going to be making trouble, they will just show up and run at the back of the pack and out of the way. The real racers will be the ones scoring points. If you want to compete at state then run fast and dont worry about it.

If we did add in altitude conversion, according to the NCAA, those 10:40 guys up in Park City would be at like 10:15. That seems a bit better but still kind of stupid to think we're qualifying guys like that when there's quite a few other guys faster than that who missed out. My good friend Alex the Lion for example missed out on qualifying the 3200 by .38 seconds and my other friend Skyalr missed State by 1 second in the 800 and 3 in the 1600 and also missed both those events by 1 place at Region.

My idea would to keep the qualifying times but do away with Region qualifiers. The qualifying times are solid (at least in 3A to 5A) so they can stay. Some years will definitely be slower than others so if not enough people qualify for State, then add the next fastest guys in. Let's say that we want like at least 20 guys to run at State so you either hit the qualifying standard or if less than 20 qualify then the top 20 in the state (including all those already qualified) make it. The number doesn't really matter. We should just have a minimum number that is used in case not enough qualify. This way people will push harder for the qualifying times and eliminate 10:40 guys and make State a little more exclusive and prestigious.

Hey good ideas but idk why you had to bring up my failures to prove your points :(

That was not a failure in any way. Missing qualifying by .38 may be heartbreaking but that was still a great race.