etrain Mailbag is like Arnold: Back

by etrain11

The etrain mailbag is returning! Get your questions in for etrain by email jarrettfelix1130@gmail.com, in comments or on twitter @TheRealTrain11. He won't be bringing you any top 500 lists, but he should still have some tricks up his sleeves for his fans. Get involved and have your voice heard! To get everybody excited, here's a little mailbag from some fake readers ...

What gives etrain? I thought you already took your vacation! Where have you been? - loyalfan
Well I used basically all of my family's monthly data in a week watching the world championships on my phone on the way into work. So then my internet privileges were provoked and there was no way I was going to be able to post.

Ok no one buys that? Alright the truth is I was adding up all the best 1600m, 3200m and 5000m times to make a ranking system for the blog. So I was way too busy to do any posting.

Alright, I admit that list sounds pretty made up and ridiculous, you caught me that's a lie too. Honestly truth, I've been working on recruiting meet directors to send results our way for the new site we are preparing: lxvplus.blogspot.com. I've got high hopes for it, but it's going to take a lot of work.

But I figure now is the time because during the season I will be doing my Top 50 every Tuesday, the Mailbag every Thursday or Friday (possible biweekly) and Team Rankings every 2-3 weeks. I will be hibernating these next couple days to prepare.

What meet are you looking forward to most this first weekend? - Lief Erikson
Even though it likely won't be bringing any of the 15:18 type times of old with the new course set up, the Viking Invitational is the one to watch. I'm intrigued to see Brophy racing in early September considering that his ultimate goal is to win the national championship in December. I don't expect him to be in top shape just yet, he's got some time to build up. That could potentially leave him open for an upset (although it's still going to be near impossible to beat Brophy).

It also will be fun to watch CB East and CB West, a couple of rivals with serious state aspirations racing each other for the first of many battles. CR North always comes to this meet, but they usually are not in top form just yet (for good reason). All the same, I'm curious who is going to step into the leadership roles on that squad, this is our first chance to take a look.

Apparently Henderson is entered? But Oakburne is this weekend so I'm not really expecting to see them toe the line with these other squads. Still something to keep an eye on I suppose.

Which individuals do you expect to steal the show this first weekend? - Curious Felix the Cat
The obvious name here is Hockenbury who came out guns blazing in week one last year in the first weekend (I believe he will be at Cliff Robins). If you haven't seen his logs, then I can summarize for you: the kid is working hard. I picked him to make footlocker nats last year as a surprise upset pick and, unfortunately, he just missed out. This year he seems driven to avenge last year's finish. Obviously, you don't want to be too sharp too soon, but I'd like to see how this year's time compares to last year's.

I also want to see what Tucker Desko is able to do for Pennridge at the Viking Invitational. The guy had a really impressive stretch run to the track season and could really shine this season. But there are always questions about how a track guy will transition to the trails.

Out west at the Gateway Invitational, I'll be watching for Casey Conboy and Jake Susalla. Conboy looked very strong on the track towards the end of last spring after some stand out races on the trails in the fall. He is a sleeper out of the WPIAL this year. Susalla is arguably the favorite for the WPIAL title this year in XC after a fantastic year in 2014. How does he handle the pressure in his first appearance of 2015?

How bad will the Sixers be this year? Should I just enter into a coma until 2020? - AI Fan90
Here's the thing, yes the Sixers will of course be bad. If we aren't bad enough, we will get worse. That's all part of the plan. But here's the thing, I'm hoping to catch a few games this year and I'm kinda looking forward to it. Like of course we will be bad, but we have some fun dudes and we finally have a Rookie who is 100% healthy! Plus we could realistically have two top five picks next year in the draft! And we are still waiting on Dario to come back over!

And as long no one points out the reality of the situation and how we have wasted multiple seasons on three dudes who practically play the same position, one of which might never play at a decent level and we still are no closer to getting to a top level in a horrible conference then I will continue to be excited!

You play any fantasy football? Who is on the squad this year? - Sam Radford
I had the first pick in my fantasy league this last weekend and I could have had anybody in the league. I decided on Demarco Murray. And I handicapped him later on with Darren Sproles.

See the above question for clarification on my being a huge homer.

Give us a bold prediction for this weekend to finish off the mailbag - putem onda spot
The fastest time of the weekend will come from somebody who is not on the etrain top 50.

And no that doesn't count the 2.35 miler at Enos Yeager.