Currently a junior.
I joined the track and field team in my sophomore year and managed to run in the track meet. Because it was my first year, the numbers weren’t great.
This year, my junior year, due to massive school workload, I quit the team and promised to make the team next year.
Next year will be my senior year. I’m quite serious about track and field since I’m very passionate about it now and I am set to improve, but as everyone may know, track season is towards April/May…so colleges might not be able to see the numbers until very late in my senior year…well, except the ones that I may report from my track and field practice sessions…
Do I still have a chance for applying for sports scholarship in my senior year?
Unlikely.
Your competition for scholarship money will have far more experience and more successes than you’re reasonably expected to have.
There is not a lot of money in track and field scholarships. Not saying there’s none, but don’t expect basketball or football type money. Most coaches base their recruiting on junior year times for the reason you point out. Without those, you will have a hard time gaining traction.
You don’t say what events you do or what your times/distances are. Go to some school rosters and see what stats their athletes post. See if you’re even in the ballpark. And coaches won’t be interested in self-reported times from practice sessions. They will want to see official meet results.
Unfortunately, just one season of track and expecting to get an athletic scholarship is very unrealistic, especially if your times “weren’t great”. Most of the athletic recruitment decisions are formulated during the end of the junior year and admission decisions are often made in the Fall of senior year. Unless you are some kind of a track “prodigy”, I do not think there is any realistic chance of any Div 1 schools recruiting you.
@janiceee, your post suggests that you may not appreciate the level of effort and dedication that scholarship-receiving students have to their sport before college. I would say most are practicing 15-25 hours per week, plus travel and competitions - similar to dedicated musicians. Somewhat tongue in cheek, if you substitute “play the violin” for “run track” in your post, I think you’ll have your answer:
I picked up the violin in my sophomore year. This year, my junior year, I quit the violin and promised to pick it up again next year.
Next year will be my senior year. I’m quite serious about playing the violin since I’m very passionate about it now and I am set to improve . . .
Do I still have a chance for applying for a violin scholarship in my senior year?
I love the violin analogy Hastomen123!!
This will sound harsh janiceee, but the question you should be asking yourself is if I can find a school that I can compete at, not if there are scholarship dollars. Timing isn’t your problem. You are grossly underestimating the level of competition in track at the collegiate level, and you are not even holding your own in hs.
There are typically 40-45 athletes on the roster sharing a portion of the (12.6 for D1 men, 18 for D1 women) scholarships. Most athletes get little to no dollars. Athletes that are competing for US colleges as foreign students are here because they have a proven track record that is better than a US athlete. e.g. two of the foreign track athletes at my sons D1 school represented their home countries at the 2016 Olympics.
Only about 5% of hs school track athletes continue in college (all levels). It is that competitive. So you will need to be better than most US hs athletes for a coach to be interested in you, highly unlikely with no current documented performances to date.
So compete this season, represent your country at the junior outdoor worlds this summer and then you can talk scholarship money.
You are international, so I’m not sure what you are saying aligns with how things tend to work at US schools. “Passionate” and “took a year off” are at odds. My D is a 3-time All-American, 4-time state medalist and is running next year at a D-I program for a small scholarship. If you are phenom maybe there is a scholarship opportunity, but with not a lot of experience under your belt, you haven’t demonstrated that you can withstand 2 or 3-season training without breaking down. I would be happy to receive an offer to be part of a D-I team and then, if you demonstrate ability to contribute, pick up scholarship in future years.
Basically, in order to be recruited, you should be regionally or nationally ranked, an Olympic hopeful, etc.
^^^Well that isn’t true, MYOS1634. Many less than Olympic hopefuls are recruited, but they are not people who take a year off and expect to be discovered as a senior. I don’t think the OP has much of a chance of getting a scholarship to a top D1 track school.
There are hundreds of lower (athletically) ranked schools, D2 schools NAIA schools that do give scholarships to mere mortals, to average athletes. It may not be a lot of money, and it may not be at a school the OP is interested in, but I feel there is a team for everyone if the recruit is willing to put in the effort. Since my daughter started school and started competing, every week I learn of a new school I never heard of with a sports program - Mars Hill, Mt. Olive, Young Harris, Indiana Tech, a dozen in Pennsylvania, Oklahoma Baptist… There are schools all over the south and midwest.
Is the OP going to get a call from Oregon, Cal, Colorado? No. Might there be a coach willing to let her walk on or even recruit with very little money to a tiny program? Yes. I think the possibility might be a little better for a female (assume ‘janice’ is a female) at a school with too many men on their sports teams who need a few women for Title IX numbers.
I agree with most of the comments so far and especially the violin analogy. I would just add two things: first, there are many countries in which Track is more club than school based, and in every one of those systems there are ample opportunities to compete in the summer (this is even true in the US, which is sort of a hybrid system). An athlete who is truly “passionate” about the sport would take advantage of those opps. Those marks could help with coaches if they are good. Second, sophomore times that ‘weren’t good’ Is rare in (significant) scholarship athletes, especially girls, even if they just started. Future scholarship athletes aren’t always the best in their events but they are usually grade-level standouts for sure on the team level and most often local/regional, and in most events that level of talent/potential is pretty clear from day one (by comparing to other kids in the same grade, to grade level school records, etc).
@twoinanddone
Unfortunately the stakes are higher for international athletes. So if the student isn’t at least regionally ranked in their country, then no, NAIA or D2 aren’t going to work. The club has to be good and the athlete has to be winning in order to get a sufficient scholarship that will make it possible for an I20 to be issued.
Late senior year is way too late in the game to get an athletic scholarship. Sorry.