Can Mason B & G repeat another double win at DI State meet

Mason is pretty good at swimming, tennis, water polo and golf. Several state champions in those sports.

They do have a fencing team.
 
psycho_dad said:
Cross Country is a "Country Club Sport"? You can't get a less expensive sport. Track and Field as well.

It's what the School / community get behind.

It's like I said before. Our family contributes to the success, but there are 10 other families that do the same. We have people that help out 10 + years after their kids have graduated. The 10 families get replaced by 10 other families as things move along. If you look at the really good programs, they not only have the best runners in races, but they often have runners that are in the back as well. Coaching that works just as hard for those kids at the back as they do for the championship level kids. A family.
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Instead of being a constant troll on this forum can you look past your blinders and look at the data? Instead of reacting pause and breathe.

If you are unable to look at the socio-economic data of the school systems that excel at cross-country at least peruse book covers at a local xc meet today at the district level. Gander at the parents of the athletes at the meet today. Look at their outfits and the cars that pull into the district meet. This is just face value of course. What counterexamples can you give me of a lower economic school that excels at cross country? When was the last time an urban area school excelled? What rural districts that are economically disadvantaged excel at cross country?
 
The Mason Boys and Girls have raced twice since this thread started and I only counted one post on here talking about those results.

Great job, everyone.
 
runs4funs said:
I'm going to go back to the original post. This Mason boys team is nowhere near their 2021 and 2022 teams in terms of depth. The 2021 team had one of their top runners DNF and won by 40, that team probably could have fielded a second team that would have placed in the top 10. The 2022 team DNF their top runner and won again, their #7 runner placed 73rd . This current team is solid 1-4 but unlike past years #5 is a question mark, and a bad day or injury to one of their top runners would be tough to overcome. Favorites yes, but far from a lock like past years.
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Yes I’m replying to my own post because I don’t want to re-type everything. Mason was missing one of their top 4 today at districts, something to keep an eye on for next week. They don’t always run their full team at districts so maybe he just sat out, if it’s something else the team race could be even more wide open.
 
EuclidandViren said:
Instead of being a constant troll on this forum can you look past your blinders and look at the data? Instead of reacting pause and breathe.

If you are unable to look at the socio-economic data of the school systems that excel at cross-country at least peruse book covers at a local xc meet today at the district level. Gander at the parents of the athletes at the meet today. Look at their outfits and the cars that pull into the district meet. This is just face value of course. What counterexamples can you give me of a lower economic school that excels at cross country? When was the last time an urban area school excelled? What rural districts that are economically disadvantaged excel at cross country?
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I've said for years that socio-economics play a part in everything. Cross county is not a country club sport. $50 buys a pair of shoes. It's what the community supports and that changes over time. Urban schools used to dominate CC. Akron and Cleveland City schools up until the late 60's. What sports do economically disadvantages schools excel at consistently? Money has nothing to do with success or failure in CC. You can train anywhere. $200 a year in equipment if you are frugal. I was able to buy two pair of $100 trainers for $80 total. Last year's model clearance. Perfectly ok for HS kid to train in. Time on task requires determination and goal setting not money.

There is a ton of untapped talent in Urban schools. They seem to prefer football. That could change. Money is not a reason.
 
psycho_dad said:
I've said for years that socio-economics play a part in everything. Cross county is not a country club sport. $50 buys a pair of shoes. It's what the community supports and that changes over time. Urban schools used to dominate CC. Akron and Cleveland City schools up until the late 60's. What sports do economically disadvantages schools excel at consistently? Money has nothing to do with success or failure in CC. You can train anywhere. $200 a year in equipment if you are frugal. I was able to buy two pair of $100 trainers for $80 total. Last year's model clearance. Perfectly ok for HS kid to train in. Time on task requires determination and goal setting not money.

There is a ton of untapped talent in Urban schools. They seem to prefer football. That could change. Money is not a reason.
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In my experience with Cross country both HS and college level is most runners come from two parent households or kids born to married parents that then divorced and both parents still highly involved in the kid's life. Sure, there are some single parent kids but not anywhere close to the ratio of the entire student population. In that aspect it is similar to county club sports that are also dominated by kids with that kind of background.

BTW keep checking Asics.com regularly and can get nice shoes for $25 or under or their $150+ shoes for under $40 but need to order 2 to 4 pairs to get free shipping. :) Black Friday is best day of the year to look.
 
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After looking at district results, I think that Mason has a great chance of the double double. Their men's team now has 7 under 16:09 on the season. And an eighth who has run 16:16, although Brendan Roe, who ran under 16 at Nike Twilight a few weeks ago, didn't run at districts. If Buckalew can consistently continue to run with Liao and Xu up front of races, they may be in business. Just looking at district results, it feels like Westerville North and Coffman have back-slid a bit from some mid-season fast times. Lancaster seems to be getting hot at the right time, but I'm not sure they'll catch Mason.

The women's race will be a battle. Davidson, Mason, and Perrysburg all have a legit shot to win, in my opinion. Hilliard is probably the slight favorite, but Mason has had a couple of girls really up their game in recent weeks. Perrysburg may have a fifth-girl when push comes to shove.
 
Supertramp said:
I actually thought St. Xavier looked better than Mas. Jackson and Dub. Coffman.

Coffman has huge gaps 1-2 and 4-5
Mas. Jackson same at 2-3.
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St. X. Is within splitting distance but 5 problem. Need huge improvement next week.

Mas. Jackson 3,4,5 very close to each other. If Mas. Jackson is better at 1 by enough, then it's scoring 4 vs 5 in about the same time frame. Is Boardman 10 or 20 seconds slower than Troy?
 
EuclidandViren said:
Instead of being a constant troll on this forum can you look past your blinders and look at the data? Instead of reacting pause and breathe.

If you are unable to look at the socio-economic data of the school systems that excel at cross-country at least peruse book covers at a local xc meet today at the district level. Gander at the parents of the athletes at the meet today. Look at their outfits and the cars that pull into the district meet. This is just face value of course. What counterexamples can you give me of a lower economic school that excels at cross country? When was the last time an urban area school excelled? What rural districts that are economically disadvantaged excel at cross country?
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East Canton citizens are not exactly sitting in the lap of luxury. Maplewood is in the middle of BFE. No idea about the socioeconomics of Maplewood's district, but EC's is definitely not wealthy.

UPDATE: ODE classifies Maplewood as "High student poverty and very small student population." Both Caldwell and East Canton (Osnaburg LSD) are classified as "High student poverty and small student population."

Incidentally, Dugan Hill believed the Caldwell program's demise began when McDonald's finally came to town - not only from a nutritional standpoint, but it gave some of the kids a place to work after school instead of participating in sports. In some cases, the kids are working to help their families financially vs. working to make some spending money for themselves.
 
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Yes Mas. Jackson’s 1 is better than Mason’s. And X was better than Mason 1-4 today, they’ve got to hope one of their 5/6 runners has the race of his life next week. The last two years D1 boys was a foregone conclusion, but this is shaping up to be really interesting. Been awhile since you could say at least 4 teams have a legitimate shot.
 
I find it fascinating to compare how Mason boys did against their competition at the regional with how Mason girls did against their competition at the same meet.
The boys won with 82 points while the girls won with 88 points.
The boys had a 0:43 (1-5) split while the girls had a 1:07 (1-5) split.
The boys won by 15 points over second place while the girls won by 7 points over second place.
 
Lancermania said:
I find it fascinating to compare how Mason boys did against their competition at the regional with how Mason girls did against their competition at the same meet.
The boys won with 82 points while the girls won with 88 points.
The boys had a 0:43 (1-5) split while the girls had a 1:07 (1-5) split.
The boys won by 15 points over second place while the girls won by 7 points over second place.
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I have never understood the significance of the 1-5 split. Two teams had smaller splits than Mason and they finished 7th and 10th. Lakota West had a very tight 1-5 split of 0:51. Sounds impressive, right? They finished 18th. 🤷🏽‍♂️
 
yj_runfan said:
I have never understood the significance of the 1-5 split. Two teams had smaller splits than Mason and they finished 7th and 10th. Lakota West had a very tight 1-5 split of 0:51. Sounds impressive, right? They finished 18th. 🤷🏽‍♂️
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I completely agree, I've been thinking about the same thing. I just don't see any correlation between a small 1-5 split and a high finish result. There are lots of examples of small splits finishing low and large splits finishing high. In region 3, Marysville had an impressive split of 0:31, the best in the region. They finished dead last. In region 5, Marlington had the 17th best split, but finished 2nd.
Yes, there are examples of it going the other way too, that's my point, there's no correlation one way or the other.
 
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I have always attributed talk about 1-5 or 1-7 team splits as something to talk about. Other sports can talk and compare teams via, passing offense, rebounds, kills, errors, etc. So, nerds of XC like most of us, find something to discuss.

I would not be overly concerned if my team had 4 sub 14:20 guys and a 16:00 5th even though our 1-5 split is nearly 2 minutes.

I think many that push team splits are indirectly saying it pays to have a 4th and 5th runner not buried in the back of the pack. And that is common sense.
 
1-5 split is certainly not the end-all-be-all, but it is an interesting statistic to look at, and certainly every team should aspire to keep their number 5 man as close to their #1 as possible.

I expected Mason to look a little sharper and more dominant yesterday. St. X has a long history of running just as hard as they have to during the season and unleashing in the last couple of weeks - they certainly seem to be trending that way. Coffman looks great. Orange seems to be coming on strong. Westerville North seems to be trending in the wrong direction just a bit. Massilon Jackson has two legit guys up front and could make things interesting.

It will be fun to see it all shake out on Saturday. Hoping for good conditions so we can see everyone fly!
 
Lancermania said:
I find it fascinating to compare how Mason boys did against their competition at the regional with how Mason girls did against their competition at the same meet.
The boys won with 82 points while the girls won with 88 points.
The boys had a 0:43 (1-5) split while the girls had a 1:07 (1-5) split.
The boys won by 15 points over second place while the girls won by 7 points over second place.
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Both teams losing through 4.
Can Lak. West pick up any points with the big advantage they have at #1? They lose a couple from the teams that didn't make it out from the Troy Regional. My guess is no. Odds are the advantage Mason has at #5 will increase at the state meet.
 
yj_runfan said:
I have never understood the significance of the 1-5 split. Two teams had smaller splits than Mason and they finished 7th and 10th. Lakota West had a very tight 1-5 split of 0:51. Sounds impressive, right? They finished 18th. 🤷🏽‍♂️
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You use 1-5 throughout the season to compare a team with itself. You also use it to be able to make comparisons for teams that don't compete against each other. Gaps between each runner is important. Most teams can develop a #1. It's much more difficult to develop a top level #5.

The kids know their teammates. They can pick them out during the race. Lessening the gap between kids you run against everyday is important. 2 reduces the gap to 1 while 3 works on reducing the gap to #2. It's important if you have a good #1. It's even more important if you don't.

Lak. West only qualified to the regional because of their tight 1-5. They essentially ran with 7 #5, 6 and 7's. 1-5 gap could not be more important to them. Real good examples are Little Miami and Walnut Hills.
 
psycho_dad said:
You use 1-5 throughout the season to compare a team with itself. You also use it to be able to make comparisons for teams that don't compete against each other. Gaps between each runner is important. Most teams can develop a #1. It's much more difficult to develop a top level #5.

The kids know their teammates. They can pick them out during the race. Lessening the gap between kids you run against everyday is important. 2 reduces the gap to 1 while 3 works on reducing the gap to #2. It's important if you have a good #1. It's even more important if you don't.

Lak. West only qualified to the regional because of their tight 1-5. They essentially ran with 7 #5, 6 and 7's. 1-5 gap could not be more important to them. Real good examples are Little Miami and Walnut Hills.
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How do you use that as a coach? Also, why report it in the results? Who does that help? I really want to understand this stat that doesn’t seem to correlate with team results.
 
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I tend not to care much about 1-5 split as a coach. Precisely because that alone has a very low correlation for the success of teams I have coached. It matters when #1 is really good. Doesn't matter nearly as much when #1 isn't as good. I actually have found that 5-8 spread matters more. (Although even that isn't a great predictor of success.) Probably simply because if there is competition for the last couple varsity slots, athletes tend to run faster in order to keep those slots. That decreases the chance that the #5 slot is hurting your team.

I think a lot of times as coaches we tend to think of 1-5 spread as important because if our team is pretty good, we get three finishers done with strong scoring positions and we are waiting, sometimes not long, sometimes what seems like ages, for the #4 and #5, or sometimes just for #5. Often the performance of the #5 runner has the most impact on the team score, so we tend to think of it as "spread" when maybe we really just want to look at how fast the #5 runner is. Honestly, I remember a discussion on Yappi way back where someone was arguing that "team A" was going to have trouble with "team B" at the state meet because their spread was too high. Even though the spread was just because the number one runner for "team A" was really fast.
 
I think that this year the team scores will be much higher than normal years. It seems like the overall team depth is much better and less individuals qualifying.
 
yj_runfan said:
How do you use that as a coach? Also, why report it in the results? Who does that help? I really want to understand this stat that doesn’t seem to correlate with team results.
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Your #1 is #1 for a reason. 1-5 is scoring, so as a coach you can get a good picture of your team by observing the split between 1 and 5. 1&2, 1&3 etc.. Since every course is different and you see different teams you can best gauge your team based off your own runners. Since #1 is #1 for a reason, it's easiest and most accurate to look at relationships to #1. If you are trying to look at other teams, you typically look at #1's and figure out a starting point and work back to number 5 from there.

Since #1 is #1 for a reason, you can see if race strategies or even training is working by the gaps getting more or less. Since 1-5 is scoring, usually it's a good indicator.

1-5 is always a good starting point. From there, you can take deeper dives if you need to.

You always want to predict where you start scoring and it's most important where you finish scoring. 1-5 helps you figure that somewhat accurately.
 
Perrysburg's ladies had a perfect score (15) at the Region 2 meet. They just might have to be regarded as the favorites to take down Mason's girls this Saturday.
 
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