Christopher Goss wrote:
> As I remember the Big Ten indoor rule (forgive me, I don't have a book in
> front of me), it states that lapped runners must leave the track until the
> race is down to a certain number of competitors. My interpretation is
that
> interference with the leaders is not the reason for the rule. It is
simply
> a way to ensure that accurate lap counting is possible for the final
> competitors on 200m tracks where lapping is frequent and can be confusing.
> It also makes for a much better show for a meet of this caliber. However,
> it does provide some interesting moments when lapped runners begin to race
> the leaders to prevent disqualification from the race.
In the early nineties, the New England Division III men's meet had a rule
like this for the 10,000m - I don't know if they still do. They also had NO
qualifying standard, ostensibly due to a relative lack of competition
opportunities in New England because of the weather. I personally felt they
should have had some sort of 5000m time to be met in order to get into the
10K.
So you'd get 50 or 60 people starting the race - mostly people too slow to
qualify in another event. You got pulled from the track if you were lapped
in the first 20 laps. However, if you were in the top 12 at the time, you
did not get pulled from the track. And this is a meet where 12th place was
usually much slower than 33:00. The result was that a bunch of 34:00-36:00
10K guys started out at 4:50-5:00 pace with the leaders and tried to hang
on. It certainly made for good show, but the 5th to 10th pace runners
nearly always ran their first 5K a good minute faster than their second 5K -
not the best way to run a 10K.
It always seemed to me like they should have made some sort of qualifying
standard and avoided the poorly run races that resulted from 40 guys trying
to PR for their 2 miles at their split in a 10K!
- Ed Parrot
