<p>Hi,
I am a junior middle-distance/distance runner, and I sent an introductory email out to some of the colleges I am interested in possibly running for (Yale, JohnsHopkins,Brown, etc.). I got a response from the Yale coach that included this:
"I'll tell you what kind of times I am typically recruiting. For juniors, I'm usually looking for athletes to run under 9:25 in the 3200m, under 4:21 in the 1600m or 1:56 in the 800m. If you have any questions, please let me know."
I am not sure sure if these times are mandatory for JUNIOR year track season. Are these times guidelines that he wants me to shoot for? or will I be of no interest if I am a couple seconds off?
The response from the Johns Hopkins coach was much longer, and had slightly slower recruiting times that had to be met by SENIOR year (not junior year, like Yale).
Any insight on this would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Since he said “if you have any questions, please let me know” you should ask him.
My interpretation - which doesn’t really matter - is that he wants to (and will be able to) fill his recruiting pool with guys who are hitting those times junior year. Ivy track recruiting will be done by your senior track season.</p>
<p>Welcome back Teddy. It can never hurt to send along updates of times as long as you’re close to the requested times. FYI - a couple seconds off the 1:56 is not really close at all … a couple seconds off 9:25 is not bad. The catch in all this is how good you look is dependent on how the coach is doing with other recruits. If 10 other folks with times under 9:20 have already contacted the coach even a 9;25 might not get you anywhere … while if the leading recruit so far only had a 9:30 then a 9:27 might look pretty good. I’d also the guess the higher your times the longer you’ll have to wait for a commitment as the coach will try to save their recruiting slots for faster runners. What are your current PRs?</p>
<p>Yale is D1, JHU is D3, so there will be differences in times as well as recruiting interest from each school. D3 coaches don’t get access to the kind of talent D1 coaches get, and so they will be looking to keep you interested. For D1, they already have so many prospects, they need a way to quickly say one athlete is recruitable while another might not be.</p>
<p>Also, in my experience with Yale recruiting (for soccer), and from research, Yale has been decreasing its number of recruiting spots as per the wishes of the Dean of Admissions (or possibly Dean of Yale, I don’t remember which) and so the coaches wish to get the best possible recruits as early as possible. In doing so, walk-ons have become much more important at a school like Yale. Just keep that in mind.</p>
<p>Yale will likely give LLs to a group of runners at or under the performance standards stated, and they will be gone by Nov 1st. So that means those times need to be met during summer post-season track at the latest. If it’s a weird year and the talent doesn’t show up, others will be entertained, but there isn’t any gamesmanship going on here. It’s a clear threshold. Good distance runners are also often pretty smart so it’s not hard for the coaches to find academically qualified runners.</p>
<p>A big improvement in XC in senior fall might do the trick.</p>
<p>But its rare for someone to suddenly run fast in the senior indoor season. That’s a lot of pressure, and most spots in this league are taken by then. Spring track of senior year? Forget it for Ivies.</p>
<p>My current PR’s (from sophomore season track) are 4:38 1600m, and 2:03 800m. I was going through the roster at Yale, and it seems like there are some runners with high school mile times etc. somewhat slower than what “is acceptable”. Are these individuals walk-ons? or strong “academic recruits”(if that even exists)? I also was curious to know if my 4.0 uwGPA (with 3 APs this year) would help me somewhat?
thank you for any help.</p>
<p>Hi Teddy - I don’t want to come off as a jerk, but it’s really not very likely that you are going to garner any serious recruiting interest in the Ivy League. Can you get admitted on your own and walk-on? Maybe. That’s where that 4.0 uw will come in handy.</p>
<p>IVY league track teams have a lot of walk-ons. When I freshman at Cornell we have something like 7 guys who were walk-ons and ran mile times in the 4:25-4:30 range … and a bunch contributed to the Cornell cross country and track teams over their time at Cornell … however none if us got any help getting admitted from our running.</p>
<p>PS - with a little improvement D3 schools would recruit you for track … are you interested in any of the NESCAC schools? … I would guess you’d get much more enthusiastic responses from them.</p>
<p>Teddy, to expand a little bit on my earlier, somewhat pessimistic post - put yourself in the position of the Yale track coach. His primary focus is to score as many team points as possible against his Ivy competitors. In the Ivy outdoor champs - it took a 1:52 in the 800m to score a single point and a sub 4:00 1500m (~4:18 1600m) to get on the board. He’s not going to recruit someone with the belief he can shave 10 seconds off his half-mile when he’s got guys available who are already in striking distance of those times.</p>
<p>The only reason he cares about your academics is a) they are high enough to meet the academic standards to be admitted or b) in a sport in which smart athletes are few, a high AI recruit could potentially allow recruitment of a lower AI athlete and still keep the total athlete AI high. As riverrunner mentioned, though, - distance runners tend to be pretty good at academics, too - so that kind of negates b).</p>
<p>Your times are good, they’re just not really D1 times. As others mentioned, you may be more competitive in a D3 program (JHU or NESCAC) but the level of coach support tends to be less there. I think your strong suit in admissions is going to be your academics - I would direct the majority of your efforts on that end.</p>
<p>what times did the hopkins coach give you?</p>
<p>how are you doing in XC this fall?</p>