Hi, I am a freshman in high school running a 4:45 mile. I was wondering if this sets me up (if I improve a lot over the next couple years) to get recruited to an ivy league school.
Thanks
To be recruited for div 1, ivy track/xc program you probably need to be running 4.15 or better for mile by end of HS. My guess is most of Heptagonal league middle distance recruits are running 4.15 and a few under 4.10 (or equivalent times for 800m and 3200m). The good news for you --4.45 as freshman shows you have talent and could potentially run those times by end of high school.
no division one school will recruit a 4.45 miler. (I am assuming you are male. If you are female running those times you will definitely get recruited!) But they certainly recruit many FORMER 4.45 milers who worked hard and improved. You can be one of them. Train hard, train smart, find a good coach and you will be amazed at how much you can improve over the next three years.
Probably the coaches will accept runners onto teams who don’t run that fast. But they will join as walk-ons, not recruits and probably won’t get much help with admissions (ie won’t get put on coach’s wish list). It’s s been a few decades since i was heps athlete, but i would hope teams still allow 4.20-4.30-type athletes to join. Some of those runners develop into very good varsity athletes.
Hard to make predictions without knowing your training history and potential. Ive seen kids hit 4.10 in 9th grade and never get better. And ive seen other kids run your times in 9th grade and become sub-four milers by college.
Good luck and run fast!
FYI here is recruiting standards for Penn track. List below includes standards for being actively recruited (first column) and walk-on (second column). I expect other ivy schools have comparable standards. I bet if you can be running 4.20 by junior year coaches would be willing to at least begin conversation with you.
EVENT RECRUIT WALK-ON
800m 1:53 1:55
1600m 4:15 4:20
3000m 8:36 8:42
3200m 9:14 9:20
https://penn-platform-api-prod-origin.silverchalice.co/v3/files/58220935e4b057735c98c28e