What a meet!
-
- May
- 31
Day one featured a great 800, where Ashley Maurer, Caitlin Hudson and Lisa Lungaro all finished within one-tenth of a second of each other. Jen Clayton, Sasha Richards, Charlotte Pope and Tonya Miller all turned in good performances as well.
Now for day two. I hardly know where to start.
Every time I turned around, someone was breaking a record or fighting through an injury or doing something else of note.
Let me start by mentioning Britney Clarke. As the meet ran right up to deadline, I wasn’t able to get her pentathlon in the newspaper. But her score of 3,394 is a new Section 1 record. Congratulations to her, she’s had a tremendous season.
So yesterday, I’m watching Nicole Corey of Tappan Zee clear 11-3 in the pole vault to break the Section 1 record. She’s on fire, and I think she might have a chance to clear the next height she chooses, 11-7. But I turn around, because I have to watch Elizabeth Mott run the 400 hurdles. Good thing I turned around.
This was one of the most amazing races I’ve seen since I started covering track in the winter. Mott is out to such a huge lead, it looks like she’s running all alone. She’s just flying around the track, and when she gets to the last straightaway, it’s obvious she has a chance to break the Section 1 record and put up a tremendous time. As she’s heading for home, the whole New Rochelle contingent in the stands is getting louder and louder cheering her on and then explodes when she cross the finish line under 59 seconds (58.7 to be exact). The top in the country this year and shattered the old section record BY OVER A SECOND.
Back to Corey for a second. She didn’t clear 11-7, but she still has the new record. She seemed excited and hopeful for states. She also told me she’ll be competing at the University of Maryland next year. I guess if you want to follow Section 1 athletes in college, the ACC is the place to do it. Clarke will be at Miami, Mott at UNC, Corey at Maryland and Avery Faeth at Virginia.
One slightly sad note from yesterday. Aisha Chisholm and Jen Clayton were tremendous in qualifying in the triple jump, but I really felt for Michelle Eberhart from Clarkstown South. She’s a great jumper, and she just missed qualifying in her senior year. It’s too bad all three can’t go, because they are all good enough to finish very close to the top at states, if not win. I know on her last attempt Eberhart had a big jump but then fell backwards, and she was upset after the event was over. It was really nice to see Chisholm do so well after being plagued by injuries all year, but it was also sad to see Eberhart miss out.
Some quick notes. Great job by Kristin Reese fighting through stress fractures in her foot to win the 1,500. She showed great toughness. Another big race for Shelby Greany in the steeplechase. I think we’re looking at a state champ there. Jen Clayton qualified in four events. If it wasn’t Clayton I’d say no chance she could be a four-event state champion, but this girl is so talented you just never know. Kudos to Charlotte Pope for qualifying in both the shot and discus. Alexis Easterling had a great two days as well, qualifying in the 200, 400, and long jump.
Overall, this was the most exciting meet I’ve covered yet. We could have a lot of state champs when all is said and done is Buffalo.
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on Saturday, May 31st, 2008 at 7:21 am by Eric Lebowitz.
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The girls 1500 was a great race, and i thought it was pretty sick how chelsea kushner was able to hang with miller-beddel(spelling?) the whole race, and to even come back to her the final straightaway and only lose by a lean was very impressive.
I agree. That was another great race. Kushner is really coming into her own. By next year she’s going to be tough. She definitely leads the way for the new wave of distance runners in Rockland.
Let’s not forget that the Ursuline School qualified eight atheltes in a very competitive Division I – 4×8 and 4×4 with two girls doubling back to run 3:57.0 with freshman phenom Kaitlin Mallinson anchoring in 57.0. Freshman Aeisha McDavid also qualified in the hurdles in 15.1. Vaulter Shardae Rawlins also went 10’0” for the top westchester performance.
Why is the spring state qualifier split between large school and small school and not conducted like the Winter meet? My opinion is the top two should go to states and the 3rd if they have met the standard. By splitting between the 2 divisions, it may qualify someone who is not in the top 3 and didn’t made the standard to go to states. I have seen this time and time again. Example, you mentioned Triple jump in your article, the top three from Division 1, were all within 1 foot to 1/2 inch of one another, then in Division II, the winner goes to states qualifying 6ft below the 3rd place Division I winner. The qualifying standard for TJ is 36’6” and a division II athlete goes at 32’.05. Congratulations to the athlete who won division II, I don’t want to take anything away from them, but is that fair?
Winter and Spring qualifications should be the same. Eberhart should be at States.
Additionally, should athlestes be allowed to compete in 4 state qualifer events?
It is the Winter state meet that is completely unfair. More than 90% of the athletes at the meet are from A/AA schools. The state is supposed to provide an opportunity for all the track and field athletes in the state to have an opportunity to compete at the state level and it is not doing so. Would we ask a classC/D football/ field hockey/soccer/baseball/etc to play against a Class A/AA athlete? Just a rhetorical question because we all know that the answer is no. Yet the state asks exactly that every March. The Spring meet is a step in the right direction. A number of years go, the state contested three separate meets. Participation in them was determined by school size. Each meet lasted approximately 3 hours and you went to the meet of your interest. It was the best solution. Now unfortunately we have the Journal News completely ignoring the division concept and ignoring the smaller schools. Their reporters did it at the Westchester County meet and they did it again on Thursday and Friday. Almost no mention was made of the Division II winners (actually little mention was also made of most Division I winners as well) and all we learned about was one or two athletes and little of the athletes from the other 60+schools. The Division concept is here to stay and we need the reporters to write about the athletes from all the schools.
The fact is, not every winner or team can be mentioned in a 450-word article. It just so happened that at yesterday’s meet, Three Div. I athletes broke Section 1 records, and one qualified in an incredible four events. Teams like Bronxville and Woodlands have gotten a lot of coverage all year. For a story to be interesting, individual performances have to be given at least a few paragraphs. Otherwise the articles would essentially just be agate. I also think that the argument for having a Class C football team compete against a Class A team is not at all analagous.
When you have one athlete competing against another, size of school doesn’t matter as much as when you have two teams with much different size pools from which to draw players. Let me use an example. Does a tennis player from Irvington get any advantage over a kid from Scarsdale during a tennis state qual? No, they don’t. Relays are a different story, as they are essentially team sports. I’m not saying the division rule is unfair, but I think ‘track and field fan’ has a legitimate argument. How is one sprinter from Class C hurt by the fact that he/she is from a smaller school than a sprinter from Class A? It’s not like a football team, where obviously a school who has 1,500 kids to form a team from has a major advantage over a school with 500. It’s one on one competition.
Here is how they are hurt…
1. a school like New Ro. has over 2,000 athletes to choose from when developing a team. That puts the chances of having a very talented athlete much higher for a large school than for a small school
2. A large school might have up to 6 coaches working with them. A sprinter in Class A is going to get a much higher level of attention than a class c athlete. A track coach can only be in so many places with so many athletes in one day
3. Please list for me all the Class A schools that do NOT have a track to practice on. There are entire LEAGUES in class C where NONE OF THE SCHOOLS have a track. The reasons for this a many and varied.
I coach at a school with less than 300 kids, we have NO track, a small budget, 1/2 the coaches of other programs if I had to compete against the Class A giants my kids would not have a chance…
Am i wrong? I think that it is an advantage to be from a larger school. I think that like other sports track should be split by school size. It allows a “fair” competition for all athletes involved. The larger schools are not BETTER they just have more conditions working in their favor.
I understand your points, in some areas the larege schools may have an advantage.
But again, I think there are arguments to be made on the other side as well.
First of all, I agree that a bigger pool improves the CHANCES of a better athlete being at a bigger school, but I still think an individual athlete from a small school can compete with an individual athlete from a large school. I’ll use the tennis example again. When a kid from Irvington is trying to qualify as a singles player for the state tournament, he/she has to beat kids from Scarsdale, New Rochelle, Mamaroneck etc. Now you’d never have a team from Class A play another TEAM from Class C – that I understand and agree with.
There are in fact Class A schools without a track, including one Dan recently wrote about whose kids were practicing in the parking lot. I’m not saying any team or relay from a small school should have to compete against a giant. My basic point is that whether you do it the winter way or the spring way, someone is likely to feel it’s unfair. If small schools have to compete against large schools, they will likely feel slighted. But if an athlete from Div. I finishes third at the qualifier in the spring, meets the standard and doesn’t qualify, while a Div. II athlete qualifies with a lesser mark, that individual and his/her coaches will likely be unahppy. It’s not an easy situation.
You have no concept of sports at a small school. Everything is vastly different from the number of coaches, the number of students, the level of competition throughout the season, the need fot those students who may be on a team to also be involved in many other facets of a school’s life. Yet you continue to ignore them. Schools like you mention, Woodlands and Bronxville, do well despite small size and that is a tribute to their athletes but you virtually ignore them every week. And you virtually ignore 99% of all the other athletes as well to tell us about your favored few. Somehow, your predecessors managed to report the entire sport every week and there was only one reporter at a time. And they had only 450 words as well. Speak to someone other than the New Ro coach or the Iona/Ursuline coach to find out what is happening. Tell me about the Fox Lane 4×800 relay, tell about the 7th grader who won the DII 1500, tell me where the athletes rank locally, state-wide, nationally. Open up your perspective to cover the entire sport, both the large schools and the small schools, and while we are at it, forget about the schools in the Bronx unless you include them all and not only Mount and Fordham Prep.
Couple of things:
1) Thank you to the JN and to both writers – I’m happy to see coverage of the sport in general. Not everyone can be mentioned and to keep the sport in the news, the record-breakers and top known competitors need to be mentioned. I would say that if your athletes are looking to get covered in the newspapers, create your own. This isn’t meant to sound snarky – more to say, if recognition is key to motivation, then make them the star at your school. This could serve to be more productive in place of jumping all over the JN gents, who day-in and day-out, write about a sport that 15 years ago only got coverage the day after a meet – if you were lucky. I know, I know…opinions are like…well you know and everyone’s got them. If you have an opinion, start your own blog.
2) When I was in HS, there were about 5 of us in Section 1, all competing for the same 3 spots to go to the state meet. All 5 of us were consistently over the qualifying standard, but 2 of us would stay home every season. Looking at the state meet results was even more insulting when you would see that all 5 could have had a decent shot at placing. Now with the Internet providing results of the other sections (and divisions), it’s almost more insulting b/c you can see what marks ARE going to the state meet and haven’t met the qualifier. This is were I believe the issue really lies. I understand that there are advantages and disadvantages to large and small schools mixing – everyone should get their fair shot. However, there should be some way around this to allow qualifying – something to the effect of taking the top 2 from each (small and big) and then the top 10 marks in the state from all around as long as they haven’t already qualified by place. They must qualify on that day too – to ward against people sandbagging because they are in the top 10. Something – it at least should be reviewed and suggestions be made. Again, I haven’t worked out the math there but maybe it could work. Adjusting the qualifing mark every 3-4 years could ensure that it is keeping with the improvements or declines in each event.
3) Kudos to Michelle Eberhart. She has had a great career and I hope that she can take all that she has done over her 4 years, look back and know that she’s better than rules about who-goes and who-doesn’t.
Remember that the athletes from DII schools, who qualify with lesser marks than DI athletes are not taking spots away from DI athletes. The DII athletes are going to their own meet, for DII athletes. Both meets unfortunatley are simultaneously contested and this causes DI people to believe they are being robbed. The same holds true for our qualifier. Futhermore, how many DII athletes managed to get the additional? One that I know of; the rest are DI athletes. The DII athletes are qualifying for their own meet; they do not take spots away from the DI athletes
I have to say that I disagree about Bronxville and Woodlands being ignored. If you check the newspaper I bet there were at least four or five articles by me alone that had Bronxville as the lead this season. They were the entire subject one of notebook. We only get to write about five notebooks in the spring. I also ranked them consistently in my top 3 for power rankings every single week. Furthermore, they were the centerpiece of the entire sports section after winning the class C meet with a headline that said “Decade of Dominance.” I don’t think that constitutes being ignored.
As for my predecessors, I know for a fact Chris Hunt used to get grief from coaches all the time, so I think the moral of the story is that you can’t make everyone happy. I will admit that even during this season I was still learning about some of the athletes in our area, but when I did, I made sure to get them in the paper.
As I am the girls beat writer and not the boys, I don’t cover those Bronx schools, but I can say that Dan covers them because he is told to do so by our editors. Those schools are covered by our paper in every other sport. That is not unique to track and field.
I don’t want to give off the impression that I think we are perfect. This was the first year for both of us on the beat, but I think saying that we have “a favored few” who get all the coverage is a bit unfair. We try to balance the coverage between outstanding performances and other great stories. I have great respect for smaller schools, I think the Bronxville girls team is absolutely amazing and I believe I’ve said as much in the newspaper.
Eric
Let me preface my remarks by saying I think you and Dan are doing a fine job and, indeed, you will never make all of the folks happy all of the time. So, keep it up—- you guys are great.
As for your coverage of the smaller schools—and the Bronxville girls in particular—you are right, you have covered them pretty thoroughly, and those girls and their coach deserve all the praise and credit in the world.
I think, however, that, in the process of covering the Bronxville girls and other better-known programs, the JN sometimes overlooks other standout individuals from small schools—schools without the running culture, administration support and reputation of, say, a Bronxville. Bronxville might be small, but the community and school justifiably take great pride in the program and, I suspect, provide support beyond what most other small school are willing to give a running program. In many districts of similar size, the school administration places more emphasis and shine a brighter light on their 7/8th grade modified lacrosse program then they do the varsity track team.
Yet, many athletes from other small school are, on occasion, able to rise to the competition without the level of support or, in some instances, coaching that the other, better known schools offer. Just keep an eye out for some of these other kids. Track, at the end of the day, is predominantly an individual sport and, hence, individual recognition is appropriate.
Again—good job.
As long as scores are kept and team champions are crowned, then track &field will be a team sport. To further the point about the lack of coverage of the smaller schools, at our Westchester County Championships, at which a record 50 schools competed, absolutely no mention was made of the boys/girls class scoring. So 2 of the 50 schools were covered properly and the rest were at best sidebars or blogs (which the athletes’ parents probably never see). New Rochelle and Iona deserved the headlines but do you even knwo who won the boys and girls Class B and C titles. The public certainly does not. Of course a small school must get the headline at a class meet but ignoring the accomplishments of the small school athletes at a state qualifier is unfair.
Once again, I didn’t choose to ignore small school athletes at the state qualifier. I felt it would have been irresponsible on my part not to give the majority of the coverage to the athletes who broke Section 1 records (and in Mott’s case ran a US #!).
The argument about team vs. individual sport is an interesting one. I would have to agree with Magister that, at a class or county meet, the emphasis is on team. I think it a state qualifier, the focus is more on individuals.
One thing I have to disagree with you on Magister, is that the past two years, the articles about the county meet never mentioned the Class B and C winners. If you look back at previous articles you will see that this is true.
I can’t comment directly on the Westchester meet, as I covered Rockland. I understand your point about the focus being on two schools primarily, but unfortunately sometimes a good article has to take one or two stories and focus on them. Without that focus, there would be no background or depth to stories.
Runfan – your point is well taken on the smaller schools. It’s not as easy to spot a big time athlete at a school without track tradition. However, I did write about Brewster’s Sam Spindel, a tremendous discus thrower from a school that’s not a traditional track power like New Ro, Mount Vernon, Bronxville etc. I have also talked about Alexis Easterling numerous times as one the best all-around athletes in Section 1. Anytime I hear of someone who is performing well but flying under the radar I try to check that athlete out ASAP.
I think all of you guys are missing the point of the previous point that this discussion started from. It’s not about coverage. It’s about how some athletes can qaulify and compete at nationals but not compete at the state meet when a DII athlete is going jumping 6’ under other DI athletes who did not make it to states. Is this fair?
Eric—I appreciate that and, again, I mean this all in a constructive sense. But I guess it shouldn’t be too difficult to spot the standout/rising athletes within the lesser programs. It’s all right there on the weekly leaderboards and meet results. The beauty of this sport is that it’s so darn quantifiable.
Every year, there is a standout runner or two from a program not heard from for years. I think the JN—which, again, overall did a decent job—might have missed a few of them this spring.
Maybe I am alone on this, but I actually think Chris Hunt did a decent job of spreading the wealth in this regard. When the JN gives these kids there due notice it helps their school’s running program (because it’s the only way anyone from within the school and community ever hears of their success).
Been reading these stupid blogs all day and it is really sad to see the Bronxville coach complaining about the coverage the “best square mile of running in the world” gets in the paper. For a person who has had so much success in his very long career I wonder why he has to complain all day about articles in the newspaper.
Also it it time to get rid of that stupid slogan.
Everyone knows how good the girls of Bronxville are what about your boys. The spring meet has it’s faults – perhaps it should be contested as separate meets/venues. But let;s not cry for Bronxville when they place 5th or 6th in the 3200 Relay at States and still are State Champions of the D2 Teams by 20 seconds.
Enough already.
No one is ever going to be satisfied with the coverage in the paper it is not FB/BB or Lax – Eric and Dan or Chris Hunt don’t make the rules, perhaps contacting the editors in charge demanding more space would be better served. I’m tired of seeing these 2 young men getting ripped all day. How would you feel if “unknown” individuals were ripping you publicly all day about your job performance – no one is perfect. Lighten up.
Division 1 vs. Division 2
As a fan of the sport for more than 25 years, I believe the discussion going on about the D-1 vs. D-2 Standards is a great one!
Here are some of my thoughts:
Problem #1: If an athlete has a performance that is in the top 10 overall in the state but does not qualify because of a strong section.
Solution: Make an automatic qualifying performance for every event so that if you hit the standard within a given time, you automatically go. The performance must be done in an invitational/championship meet and for a track event must be F.A.T.
Problem #2: D-I vs. D-II / Federation all at the same place at the same time at the same state meet.
Solution: Follow New Jersey’s Plan… make a AA state meet, an A state meet a B state meet and a C/D state meet all on the same weekend at different sites. The top 3 in each event from each class go to the Meet of Champions one week later. If an athlete hits the automatic mark and they do not place in the top 3 in their class state meet, they go to the meet of champions as well.
Problem #3: The state qualifier is an anticlimatic track meet, especially for the division II schools in section one.
Solution: Any suggestions?
Trackfan#2,
I can’t agree with you more. Having been a marginal track athlete in high school, the state qualifiers didn’t mean anything to me because I wasn’t good enough to qualify.
Your solution to problem #2 is exactly what I would prefer. You have the sectional class meets, then the winner of each class plays in a state class championship. That way if you are a good athlete, but have no chance to qualify at states at least your season can continue to a state final.
I do think the standards need to be changed. Section 1 may have the best athletes in the state, but they have the same amount of athletes qualify as a lesser section. It doesn’t make sense. There should be standards and the winner from each division in the event automatically qualifies regardless if they meet the standards. Then anyone else who meets the standard qualifies for states.
For your third problem, I don’t really have an answer. Can anything be done to change that? If you have a shot at a federation title obviously states means something, but I don’t know what you could do.
Dan, thanks for the response… imagine what it would be like:
2008 State Class Championships (Rotating Sites Every Year)
1st weekend in June
AA- White Plains HS
A- Liverpool HS
B- Lancaster HS
C/D- Colonie HS
Catholic League- Mitchell Athletic Complex Uniondale
NYC- Ichann Stadium
2008 Meet of Champions (Every Year somewhere in section IV- U.E. or Vestal HS since section IV is in the absolute middle for most sections)... or wouldn’t it be great to have the meet of champions at NYC’s Randalls Island, where the 100m world record was broken? Probably wishful thinking because upstate would complain too much!
Who is in charge of this and how does one go about making change?
I have been away from the blog for the weekend and I see that I have stirred up some controversy. My blog was not about coverage but about the fairness of the meets. I really like what TrackFan#2 has to say about how to structure the Championship meet and am in agreement.
There are a few interesting themes in this thread. Let me start by writing that the Journal News reporters are sometimes criticized unfairly. Track is a complicated coverage area-multiple individual and relay events and numerous big meets. Ideally, the coverage the sport has received would be more uniform in terms of fact-checking and writing, but these guys are learning on the job, have gotten better over the course of the season and will continue to get better as they learn more about the athletes. And they are interested and enthusiastic, which is great.
There seems to be an indictment of the Bronxville coach, Jim Mitchell, for seeking coverage for his squad and an indictment of Bronxville itself in a post by “Ashamed of You” who, ironically, also complains about other posters for their “anonymity”. Coach Mitchell has not signed any post and if in fact he has posted anonymously, then good for him, since the posts have helped start a good dialogue.
I think that the points made by different people about the coverage of the sport and also of the issues involving school size and state qualifications are good ones. As a parent of a small school athlete, I have seen discrepancies in the coverage as certain big schools and small schools (yes, including Bronxville) get a lot of press while great performances by teams from other schools and also “non-renowned” athletes (including some lesser known kids from powerhouses like New Rochelle, Mt. Vernon, Somers, Ursiline, Suffern, Woodlands, Bronxville, etc.) are ignored.
The bottom line is that there is a Class system in NY Public High School sports and that should be recognized in the coverage of the sport, as well as in the State Championship system. The points raised by Track Fan#2 are very good with respect to state championship qualification thresholds and while it may be difficult to schedule and coordinate separate championships for each size school, applying the principle of separate championships for Large and Small schools followed by a Meet of Champions, is a great idea, for both winter and spring seasons.
Let’s support our kids’ sport. The Journal News writers are trying to do this, as are parents and the great coaches in this County.
Track parent – we appreciate the support. And not everyone criticizes us, some do, some don’t, and many who do, do it in a constructive manner which is fine.
I think you make some excellent points.
The main thing I want to say is that, any dialogue on the blog is good, because it lets us know how the readers/fans are thinking and feeling. I don’t mind being criticized as long as people do it in a fair and civil manner. I don’t think there’s any need for nastiness by anyone on here, and I think for the most part people are respectful.
As far as overlooking certain athletes, it may happen from time to time, but I also think that, because we have so many tremendous athletes in our area, sometimes outstanding performances demand attention. For instance I got an email from someone saying “We all knew what Elizabeth Mott could do at the state qualifier.” While it’s a legitimate point that people are aware of how good Mott is, I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t focus my story on a local athlete who runs a US #1 time in an event.
Again though, both Dan and I are excited that people are posting on the blog. Because we can’t talk to the hundreds or even thousands of fans that attend some meets, this is really the best way we have of really getting your take on what’s going on.