NCAA At Large Selections

[gh]

Yeh, what's the point of inviting 18 relay teams? Just like indoors with the men's dmr, many of these teams will not be competitive.

Imagine how much better the NCAA would be without the relays at all? All those extra bodies to deserving people in individual events.

The NCAA should crown national relay champions in ALL the relays, and could rotate the events between Penn & Drake.

Put some truth behind Penn's claim of "relay championship of America"

[jazzcyclist]

Yeh, what's the point of inviting 18 relay teams? Just like indoors with the men's dmr, many of these teams will not be competitive.

Outdoors the relays are short and you can have rounds; indoors the DMR is the only relay and you cannot have rounds. Different animals. Also, unlike the sprints, there is not a wind-aided element in the 4xX00, although there is the time/strategy issue in the 4x400 (better teams can keep from burning their matches a bit (is a single replacement allowed?).

I believe that two replacements are allowed in relays. In 2006 "X-Man" and Willie didn't run 4x400 relay prelims at NCAA.

In fact they didn't run 4x400 between PennR and NCAA finals. They skipped SEC, Regionals and NCAA heat.

A little more info:
In 2006, LSU was undefeated in the 4x400 outdoors (9-0). On three of those occasions (Texas Relays, Penn Relays and NCAA's), the final was preceded by a heat, meaning that they ran a total of 12 times that outdoor season. Those three finals were the only time that LSU ran their "A" team (with Willie and X-man) all year. LSU's "B" team (sans Willie & X-man) was the fastest qualifier for the NCAA's, and there is no doubt in my mind that they could have won the NCAA title without X-man and Willie. I doubt that even Baylor has ever been that deep in the 4x400. The plan was to lower their year-old NCAA record, and everything was going according to plan halfway through the race, but it all went up in smoke when the third leg went out in 20.5, though LSU still held on to win by a comfortable margin.

[HigherEd]

The process of selection

Here is how it works for individuals

First, all 20 declared automatic qualifiers from the regional championships are entered. Then one more athlete is entered across the board in all 19 events. You keep adding a layer across all events until you can't add another complete layer. At that point athletes are entered from a priority list. That priority list is a rank order of strongest event through weakest event. The next athlete available, plus ties is added to the field. Some years there are multiple ties. The cap is 544 athletes per gender and the count is constantly looked at. An athlete can preference an event (I want to run the 5K if I get in that event, but will run the 10K if I don't get accepted in the 5K). Preferences cause major havoc with the selection process. The current process with automatic qualifiers and at-large qualifiers is complex. An athlete who finishes 15th at regionals can slowly move up through scratches, preferences and end up 12th, which then gets them in the at-large pool. Athletes are rank order based on their seasonal best performance.