<p>I'm interviewing a D3 track coach tomorrow for my blog. I plan on asking about the degree of influence he has with admissions, whether he utilizes recruiting services and how the FA office works with the athletic dept. Any other questions you'd like me to ask?</p>
<p>What about the college experience for a D3 track athlete? How many athletes does he recruit? How many does he expect to stay with the team for four years? What is his recruiting schedule? When should a prospect contact him – at what point in high school, at what point in the year? What’s too early? what’s too late? What are the walk-on options?</p>
<p>-- my son is a 2010 D1/Ivy athlete grad so I am just throwing out these questions as conversation, not because <em>I</em> need to know</p>
<p>Great ideas - thanks</p>
<p>Does he ever offer roster spots for exceptional students who are marginal athletes and therefore not likely to play, i.e., to boost team GPA etc.? If so, does he actively recruit such students?</p>
<p>Is it difficult for athletes to major in some subjects because of scheduling. Do any of the athletes participate in study abroad (if you’re interested.) Are athletes usually assigned to room with other athletes in dorms? Does the school set the practice time for the athletes (at my son’s school practices are supposed to be held during a certain time period.) Are there any costs, travel or equipment, that the athlete will be expected to pay.</p>
<p>you listed exactly the questions I would like to ask! Can’t wait to see the answers…</p>
<p>How does he deal with kids who are god enough academically to be recruited, good enough to walk on, but not good enough to offer a slot?</p>
<p>Besides athletics, what does he like to see in a recruit? Dos and donts of correspondence with the coach and campus visits?</p>
<p>Will you post the link when you have it written?</p>
<p>It was a great interview - very candid. I’ll post some of his answers here, I don’t think it’s permitted to put up a link.</p>
<p>WashU Div 3 Track and XC - USTFCCA D3 coach of the year</p>
<p>What do you look for in a recruit besides times?</p>
<p>I guess number one would be that they are authentically interested in our institution. When you recruit at a higher-end academic school, you tend to get a lot of people that just want to go to a good school and they’re looking at 20 schools. So we’re looking for kids that picked us out, honestly. There are students out there that play a game and they’re telling every coach the same thing, all the while they’re going to go to whatever school is ranked number 1 on their list – if they get in. So our first thing is to find kids that are really authentically interested in WashU – not just, ‘hey I want to go to a good school’ – but I’ve done my research .We don’t necessarily have to be the top choice going in, but they should have it narrowed down to a realistic number. We’re on their list, and they know why we’re on their list – they know what we have to offer. So that would be number one.</p>
<p>Obviously, WashU is very academically competitive, are you able to support recruits through the admissions process and how does that all work?</p>
<p>We definitely can support students. Now, ours is different than my understanding of some schools where they can have guaranteed admission spots. At some schools, they’ll crunch numbers and if you hit minimum numbers, they can get you in. And that’s not how it is at WashU. Here, they’ll absolutely take the coach’s input, and there are times when that probably is the difference. But it’s not one of those things where upfront we’re going to know who that is. So there’s definitely the opportunity for support, it definitely makes a difference, but there are also no guarantees that if you hit this number and the coach supports you, you’re in.</p>
<p>As a D3 coach, obviously you can’t give any athletic money. Are you able to help the athletes access merit or need-based aid?
We can just point them to the website and direct them to the people. That’s definitely one of the hard things about D3 – you’re going to lose kids and you can’t do anything about it. Money is a big factor, especially nowadays. There’s no doubt that at the Division 3 level, you’re at the mercy of their financial aid package, which we have no input on. But, it’s one of those things that, you’re going to get some kids that you don’t recruit because they got an (academic) scholarship. And they’re going to call you up in May and say, “Hey, I’m Joe Smith and I ran this time in the mile and I’m coming – I got this scholarship I’d like to run on your team.” So there are times when we’ve benefited from it. But as a coach, it definitely can be frustrating when you go through the whole process and the kid wants the school, but in the end, financially, they get a much better deal someplace else. But that, unfortunately, is just part of the Division 3 experience.</p>
<p>Tell me a little about the lifestyle of the athletes – how accommodating is the track practice schedule for kids who might have conflicts with their classes?
In XC, our main practice is in the morning, and we avoid class schedule conflict, so that works out really well. Now it is tough, and they have to be intrinsically motivated to make it happen because we’re going at 6:30 or 7:00 am. We give them 2 days off each week to train on their own to accommodate for academic stuff. And then in track we go in the afternoon and we tell them, our practice time is at 4:15, we want you there. But we know, we’re going to have to work around some kid’s schedules. I would say on a given day, we’ll probably have 70% there and 30% will have to go to an alternative time. But it depends on the semester and the major. Like junior year engineering, for example, tends to have a lot of labs. We had a kid who was an NCAA runner up who was a 5th year senior and he had some grad classes and his schedule was never going to allow him to be at practice all year. So he had to work out at alternative times the whole season. So we had to work around that, it’s just part of the reality of it.</p>
<p>We don’t want them to take classes during practice if they have a choice, but we know, as coaches, it’s going to happen and we’ll work with the student to make it the best we can. But again, that’s why they need to be intrinsically motivated. It’s not like high school where you just show up and all your teammates are there. Sometimes, there’s just not a great time so they’ll have to be there at 7:30 am because that’s the only time they have. So it’s definitely challenging, and that’s why the number 1 thing we’re looking for is people who really love what they do</p>
<p>How many hours are the track kids working out during season?
I’d say 2 to 2 ½ hours per day would be the norm. If you include the training room, maybe 3 hours. But some days might be 75 minutes because we have a meet coming up. But I usually say 2 ½ hours is what you need to plan on.</p>
<p>Varska–where can we find your blog?</p>
<p>It’s at tier1athletics(dot)org</p>