Greg Beal, on , said:

Who knows. Maybe they just weren't too concerned about how they raced at McQuaid, and thought a hard race in their league meet would better prepare them for later races this season. Either way, it's FM, they are plenty talented, and I'm sure they'll bounce back with another strong performance soon enough.

watchout, on , said:

Bill Meylan on a Sept 23 race run by FM - "Fayetteville-Manlius (Boys & Girls) posts highest National Team speed ratings of the season"

1 1 Annika Avery SR 1 Fayetteville-Manlius 17:21.8 5:54 140.73 141
2 2 Jenna Farrell JR 1 Fayetteville-Manlius 17:22.8 5:54 140.40 140
3 3 Samantha Levy JR 2 Fayetteville-Manlius 17:28.8 5:56 138.40 138
4 4 Sophia Ryan FR 1 Fayetteville-Manlius 17:37.1 5:59 135.63 136
7 7 Olivia Ryan SR 3 Fayetteville-Manlius 18:26.6 6:16 119.13 119
9 9 Reilly Madsen SO 2 Fayetteville-Manlius 18:37.9 6:19 115.37 115
10 10 Mackenzie Pierie SR 4 Fayetteville-Manlius 18:39.9 6:20 114.70 115
11 Jessica Howe SR 5 Fayetteville-Manlius 18:41.1 6:21 114.30 114
12 Palmer Madsen FR 3 Fayetteville-Manlius 18:56.2 6:26 109.27 109

I guess this effort might have affected their McQuaid performances four days later. Odd that they would take an eight-team league meet (I guess that's what it was) more seriously than McQuaid.

Noticed this result for the FLRunners Race of Champions in Florida on Tully Runners. Don't know if this team will be a factor this year but with 7th and 6th grade sisters at #1 and #3 and another 7th grader at #4, they may only get better:

flrunners.com Invitational FL
Girls ROC - Top Team
1 Yared, Tsion 7 Pine Crest HS 18:33.07 132.98 133
6 Montgomery, Julia 11 Pine Crest HS 19:08.59 121.14 121
22 Yared, Mahdere 6 Pine Crest HS 19:44.00 109.33 109
50 Schwartz, Amanda 7 Pine Crest HS 20:48.22 87.93 88
60 Jovanovic, Katherine 10 Pine Crest HS 21:04.15 82.62 83
65 Stevanovich, Katarina 12 Pine Crest HS 21:08.64 81.12 81
67 Vreeland, Simone 10 Pine Crest HS 21:08.85 81.05 81
83 Yared, Mahlet 12 Pine Crest HS 21:29.36 74.21 74
139 Walker, Sarah 10 Pine Crest HS 22:54.17 45.94 46

MatthewXCountry, on , said:

I don't know if FM is plagued with injuries or what. Maybe they just had a bad day, or trained too hard during the week and/or overlooked their opponents because they're more concerned about later races. To be honest, I probably dropped them even further than I should have (they have a good argument for being ahead of Davis and Blacksburg, they score out close enough and it is FM, however Davis and Blacksburg have an unblemished record while racing top teams this year while FM lost to Elmira), but that doesn't do anything to answer what I think is your actual question (Why did FM stay ahead of Elmira when Elmira beat them?) ... the answer to that is FM started off the stronger team, and while the gap shrank with Elmira's win, it didn't disappear. Also, it is relevant to point out that the four teams that passed Elmira didn't improve enough to pass FM (in other words, Elmira's race at McQuaid was good enough to pass 4 teams that were previously ranked ahead of them). The four teams that passed them, not surprisingly, all had at least 1 new scorer: Buchanan has a freshman running as their #4, Hinsdale Central has a freshman at #3 and at #4, Monarch has a freshman at #5, while Birmingham Seaholm has a freshman at #3 and a sophomore I hadn't included in the preseason at #5 (who didn't run XC last year and was a 2:30/5:51 girl this spring) -- so, the only teams that passed Elmira are teams that got freshmen who are already making an impact, while Elmira didn't get any new scorers.

Yes, the end result is that FM dropped 6 spots in the rankings while Elmira stayed put. However, I do think the fact that 4 teams previously ranked ahead of Elmira are now ranked behind Elmira due to how well Elmira ran and how those other four teams (Cherry Creek CO, Unionville PA, Pennsbury PA, and Fort Collins CO) have run is of at least some note.

DougB, on , said:

I'm sure that I'm just missing something, but how is it that Elmira beats Manlius and while Manlius falls 7 spots in the rankings, Elmira doesn't move up at all? Is Manlius plagued with injuries?

watchout, on , said:

I think allowing the JV team to compete at the state meet would be really silly. However, I think it would be a great idea to hold a JV state/national championship where the best JV teams competed against each other. If it's held on the same course that the varsity runners compete on you can always do a post race merged results analysis to see how your JV team would stack up against the varsity squads.

Early results from last night and today:

#3 Desert Vista (51) had no issues winning the Desert Twilight last night over Xavier Prep (112) and Rio Rancho NM (119)

Marcus (58) won Nike South over Southlake Carroll (93), New Braunfels (94), The Woodlands (113) and College Park (123)

#6 Blacksburg VA (53) rolled at Great American over LaSalle RI (105), Green Hope NC (130) and #14 Saratoga Springs NY (143)

Side note: Libby Davidson's winning time of 17:07.3 is #5 All Time at the WakeMed, and runner-up Ryen Frazier's time of 17:22.7 is #12. Blacksburg's team time of 91:28.9 is good for #7 All-Time, and LaSalle's 92:06.2 puts them at #11.

There is a great misconception that the CA State Champs, or even NXN, is actually a compilation of the absolute best teams within the allowable borders to run those respective races. It is not. The CA State Champs would be comprised of 90% Southern Section teams if it were merit based. It is supposed to be a representation of all of CA's sections. The overall quality suffers a bit, but the best teams still rise to the top and make the schools from Oakland look silly.

NXN is largely the same. CA can only send 2 or 3 teams even though the girls currently have 9 teams ranked in the top 25.

If you could send "B" and "C" etc. teams to championships then Kenya and Ethiopia would have about 80% of the contestants in the 5000, 10000 and Marathon at the Olympics.

Quite honestly, I'm all for it, but that's a battle that is never going to be won.

GeorgieTheK, on , said:

I agree with Joe, meet management would make a spot ruling to prevent a 2nd team from a school from qualifying but I don't see them stopping those kids from running in the qualifying race for open spots to nationals if they're resume shows they're deserving of that.

GeorgieTheK, on , said:

I can guarantee that this would not be allowed. NXN rules don't cover every situation and sometimes spot rulings need to be made.

Quote

One g old reason for not allowing more than one varsity team in a competition is that the rules don't permit it. The rulebook states the first 7 runners from a team (school) make up a team and the first 5 are scored and all other runners from the same school are ignored. Some states prohibit the entry of more than one varsity team in a race or a meet. I don't know about you but I doubt that the NFHS would get enough of a groundswell across the country to change the rules so that the very talent rich/large schools could take another spot in a meet. There is a further ramification that would affect track. If you allowed this it follows that you would have to allow teams who were say talent-rich in the spinets (Long Beach Poly in their great years comes to mind) to have more than one relay team in a race.

If you think along the lines of "its not the kids' fault that they live in a district where there are many talented runners" then why shouldn't the 4th 800 meter runner from a school put up a similar protest when she cannot run in a meet even though she's a 2:09 runner because there are 3 kids that are faster than she is?