XC is basically over, but somehow we can't seem to escape it. Without track races to give me a little extra something to write about I turn my attention back to the big news from the center of the state.
The District 3 championship has moved to Big Spring High School and will now be held on the Saturday before the state championships. (thanks to Sean Collins for breaking this news)
The spring board for the move came when it was revealed a new road was being constructed that bisected the parkview course at Hershey.
The construction and unanimous decision to move by the D3 committee suggests the state location will be the next to move. Considering many have had frustrations with Hershey before this road, it seems probable that if/when the state meet can be moved, it will be.
This is huge news for a variety of reasons. As I have documented in depth here on this site, I am a strong believer that the D3 athletes were put at a disadvantage running the difficult Hershey course back to back weeks. There is clear evidence that this has been the case and although many have either chosen not to make excuses or chose to be optimists, I imagine there are many rising Seniors eager to transition away from the Chocolate Park.
Another interesting piece of this, is the move from Wednesday to Saturday. As Sean pointed out in our podcast together, placing a championship meet on a Wednesday is very counter intuitive to a runner's typical work weak. It takes careful coaching to navigate what is often a Saturday, Wednesday, Saturday type schedule. The move to Saturday does create a bit of a storm delay problem (the meet would have to be run on a Monday most likely) but overall, it appears to be another positive for D3 harriers.
But it's not all good news. The biggest foreseeable issue is facing Mid Penn schools who will now be looking at back to back races at Big Spring. Big Spring is not quite as lethal as Hershey, but it is certainly a difficult course in it's own right. I don't know exactly how the 5k relates to the 6k and 8k, but both of these college races feature some nasty back hills.
Plus if Hershey does indeed get the state meet pulled out from under them, where is the most likely place to put it? I'd wager Big Spring its probably near the top of the list, having just proved it's capability for hosting a big meet when it hosted the D3 Mideast Regionals for the second time in three years.
That would mean there exists a situation where a team (like one of next years top contenders Cumberland Valley) could run the Big Spring course three straight weeks. (4 straight weeks if you count fake meet of champs)
I'd imagine Mid Penns will have it's championship race a full two weeks out from Districts which should help alleviate the problem, but we could end up with a similar back to back issue for the D3 teams in 2015 or 2016.
It's also possible that the well known Carlisle course, which hosts one of the biggest invites of the year, could sneak in and take either the MidPenn championships or the state championships (more likely the former in my mind).
The move also opens the door for the rotation ideas that have been proposed by some individuals/teams to rotate the state championship meet to a variety of locations over the years. Maybe a Coopers Lake/Cal, Big Spring, Belmont Plateau type rotation is suddenly in play?
I personally love the move as many are probably not surprised to hear. I love that Big Spring course and just doing a normal run there a month ago was a fun experience. I think it's a great championship course and it makes much more sense than the brutality that was back to back Hershey.
That's the bottom line here. In my eyes it's a big win for the athletes. Sure the decision was probably made because of the road and not because of complaints from people like me on a blog that no one connected to that meeting reads. But either way, in my eyes the athletes are going to have a much better chance at success.
And shouldn't what's right for the athletes always be the obvious decision?
As a former Carlisle runner, I'm going to weigh in on the likelihood of Carlisle taking either States or Mid-Penns.
ReplyDeleteOn the States front, I would give it a 0% probability of it being held at Carlisle. While the course could hold the runners easily, parking would be a large issue. There is also a large disadvantage for the Carlisle coaching staff in holding the championship there. As anyone who has hosted a meet knows, the head coach (and meet directors) are hounded with other coaches' questions, complaints, officiating issues, facilities issues and the million other things that distract a coach from actually coaching his/her team. It is for this reason that I believe Carlisle would decline an opportunity to hold the State meet. This does not hold for Big Spring generally because they have not regularly sent runners to States (The Todaros are the only ones I know of on the men's side), while Carlisle has had at least one runner qualify for the last 6 years or so.
The Mid-Penn Championship may be a different issue for Carlisle though. Without great alternatives beside Big Spring, the meet would likely fall to Carlisle in the minds of the other 30 schools in the conference. There may still be some resistance, but the lack of alternatives makes it seem that Carlisle has a 50% likelihood of hosting Mid-Penns. I also believe that Mid-Penns will only move if the State course is moved to Big Spring. Without that change, District 3 and Mid-Penn will most likely be there.
Finally, Big Spring has previously petitioned PIAA for the State Championship and has been denied unanimously with all votes to Parkview. We shall see if this was PIAA being stubborn, or if they truly do not see Big Spring as a championship course and would move the meet somewhere else instead of Big Spring.
I think it is highly unlikely that they move it from Hersey. Just about every state championship in PIAA is held there, so I think they would want to keep it there. And other championship events are held at PSU, so I believe if they do move the meet, it will be moved there
ReplyDeleteI'm curious to know more about the course at Big Spring, what are times usually like there? And what's the course record?
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