Situation with HSers at Texas Relays

[BillVol]

Lee mentioned that the Texas HS sports governing body has moved their district meets to coincide with the Texas Relays. He said that he expects attendance will be less because of this.

Just wondering: With all of the partying going on in town, including many people coming to Austin not affiliated with the Relays, I wonder if the HS governing body did this on purpose, to get their high schoolers away from this party element. As we all know, HSers know how to sneak out of a hotel and get where the action is. We've all done it ourselves.

I have no idea if the HSers are even near where the parties are taking place. I've never been to Austin. But you have to wonder. Otherwise, why take away from such a great event as the Texas Relays?

[TrackDaddy]

I don't think that's the reason at all.

The dates for Texas Relays and district meets have been an issue for many Texas high schools for years.

More than anything it's just a scheduling conflict.

In fact, I don't think this will happen again.

[Cooter Brown]

District has always been the week after Tx Relays.

What happened was that the UIL accidentally released the calendar from either last year or the year before for '08. All the districts scheduled their meets based on this old calendar to meet the certify-marks-by date (which is Friday 5pm). A few weeks later, UIL went "oops" and set the correct '08 calendar with correct date (next Friday) which would have pushed the district meets to next week instead of TX Relays week. Since most of the districts couldn't care less about track, the majority did not reschedule.

[HMoley]

I don’t think the party aspect of it had much to do with it.

The UIL originally scheduled the certification date for April 9th, which meant the district meets had to be completed by then. This year meets are prohibited during the week of April 10-12 because of a conflict with the UIL Academic Regional Meets. They also had to work around the Regional Musical competition. Finally the TAKS testing schedule had to be considered. UIL relented in February and issued a statement that the certification date would be pushed back to April 16th allowing district meets to also be held April 14-16. With this change, 2-5A schools could hold their district meets March 31-April 5th and April 14-16th.

http://www.uil.utexas.edu/athletics/track_field/

In Texas, no coach is going to miss the district meet because it is the first step in getting an athlete to the state meet. Top 3 go one to regionals and top 2 at regionals move on to state. Top 8 -Finals only at the Texas state meet.

[TrackDaddy]

District has always been the week after Tx Relays.

What happened was that the UIL accidentally released the calendar from either last year or the year before for '08. All the districts scheduled their meets based on this old calendar to meet the certify-marks-by date (which is Friday 5pm). A few weeks later, UIL went "oops" and set the correct '08 calendar with correct date (next Friday) which would have pushed the district meets to next week instead of TX Relays week. Since most of the districts couldn't care less about track, the majority did not reschedule.

I know.

This is so irritating.

Thanks for the information, CB.