Combining the AUS and the QSSF

[Chris Moulton]

I have been following an intersting discussion on trackie.ca about the fact that AUS has many qualifiers whose performances this year are well below the standard of their competitors at CIS, so I thought I would bring it over to this board.

My basic proposal is this, combine the AUS which has really only 1 full track team plus two other teams who specialize in a few events and the QSSF which has 3 full track teams. Then give the AUS/QSSF group one automatic bid, this would allow one more athlete to qualify based on time, this athlete would generally be from the West or Ontario but on occasion would come from the Q or AUS.

Such an opportunity would also allow AUS schools whose conference championship takes place on a slow track in Moncton to compete on much better tracks in McGill and Sheerbrooke.

To further bolster my argument here are the statistics

Slowest qualifier
w m
60 time aus
300 aus qssf (aus declined mens)
600 aus aus
1k time oua (note the mens aus member declined)
15 qssf aus (note eric gillis i don't question his entry)
3k qssf oua
60h qssf time (aus declined)
4x2 time time
4x4 aus time
4x8 aus aus
hj qssf perf (aus declined)
pv perf perf (aus declined)
lj qssf perf (aus declined)
tj perf perf (both aus and qssf decline w, aus men)
sp qssf perf (aus declined)
wt perf aus (aus w declined)

statistical break down
aus had the last ranked entrant in 9 of 19 (47.3%)
qssf had the last ranked entrant in 7 of 30 (23.3%)

Now I know people from the AUS will come on and say this an outrage, we never get to run on fast tracks are times will be faster etc. But in having the meet at a Mcgill or Sheerbrooke AUS athletes will have the opportunity to run fast, by combining the two the country will have three strong conferences instead of two strong conferences and two mediocre ones.

Anyhow just thought I would get the discussion going. Good luck to all at CIS.

[Dietch]

Moulton, love the idea.
But the question is, would one year you actually have to host the Conference at the 8 sided Dalplex track due to representation? I am sure Meité would put down a blazing 36 high in his 3.
All jokes aside, it seems really plausible. I say go for it
ND

[young]

Good topic Moulton.

I like the idea of combining the QSSF and AUS. I don't think it will ever happen. If they were combined, a combined QSSF/AUS conference should get two CIS berths in all individual events like CW and OUAs. I don't think it would be good for the sport to take away a berth. Further, they should get the guranteed single berth in relay events like CW and OUAs. And a combined conference championship would give these athletes (especially the AUS folks) an opportunity to race better competition.

I can't see this arrangement ever happening. The future of CIS track depends on a strong QSSF conference and a stronger AUS conference based on the current arrangment.

Despite the naysayers, I think both conferences are moving in the right direction. I point to a Laval team that has seemingly been resurrected under coach Vincent Paquet to complement solid programs at McGill and Sherbrooke. And the QSSF fraternity welcomed ETS into the fold this year even if they have only a select few athletes. In the East, my sense is that the coaches are recruiting more than ever and there is a real momentum to raise the bar (at least in the middle distance and distance categories).

All the same, a stimulating topic Chris.

Best regards, see you at CIS,

Brad Young

PS - our twilight dates at Mac should be out some time next week

[davidson]

Wow, I tried to follow that whole thread at trackie, but it was just way too long.

For the most part I think on paper it's a decent idea, and I agree with Brad, give them 2 auto-qualifying spots. There could be a couple of problems with that format. 1) it is concievable that one of the two regions could not be represented at CIS at all. This would pretty much make the amalgamtion contrary to the idea of a national championship (where the whole country is represented). 2) since the travel costs may become quite high, some schools may fully or partly cut their programs because it costs to much. this again would be contrary to the idea of University sports which part of the philosophy is giving everyone opportunities to excel. Though some would argue that the CanWest teams have to pay quite a bit and travel pretty far (Winnipeg is two time zones away from Victoria - and I should note, the closest we would go for CanWest would be Calgary, which is still pretty far).

The positives of this approach would be the increased competition for both the AUS and the QSSF schools. One of the main points on the trackie site was that there are not really any good indoor tracks in the AUS. This problem would be partially relieved, but every other year or so, the meet would have to be held at one of the AUS tracks.

A better solution to this problem might be to try and promote the sport out east. From what I see in results this year, the AUS is pretty comparable to other schools (Dal in cross, and Gillis too).

Maybe another option to solving the problem is to change the qulification process. The standard could be lowered so that more people make it. For example they could base it on the 8th or 9th place finish the year before. They could keep the auto-qualifiers and then not let anyone else in. This would take away all the wondering that went on last weekend whether people are in or not and it would certainly stop any arguing or disrespect directed at those in other conferences (as was done on trackie).

I don't know what the best solution is, but I can be pretty safe when I say that this probably won't be changed any time soon. But it definitely is an interesting topic to discuss.

[mcbride]

Another idea is to keep it the way it is. But have a 2 day meet say at McGill or Sherbrooke that is similar to cargill games for eastern canada. That way we have a big meet that we could send the best athletes from the east coast to. This way not everybody or even all the schools have to travel and programs will not have to be cut. This year we (Dal) travelled to Sherbrooke, however it was a fairly small meet, early in the season and only one day. I would like to see a meet where it is two days, so we have a chance to run one individual race and a relay.

[Brooksy]

Chris i think it's a good idea but not feasable. Nick's idea sounds like the best compromise. Even our team which is well represented at cis had to go down to big meets in the states in order to run the times that put our athletes in the top ten rankings.
Davidson, the one part about your post i disagree with is that:
"This would pretty much make the amalgamtion contrary to the idea of a national championship (where the whole country is represented"
I think that a national championships is for the best athletes in the country to compete against each other, regardless of where they are from. If the ten fastest people in the country are from canwest for example, then it should be those ten contesting at a national championship. Adding in slower people just to diversify the field would just be taking away the essence of a national championship being "the best athletes in the country"

[trackstats]

There is some great potential to the interlock concept but not for the reasons suggested. The current format works well to ensure the best get to the start at CIS.

Yes the AUS has slow seed times once again. They always do, but what happens when they compete head to head on equal footing at the championships. These are the stats you should be looking at.

34 events contested at CIS

In 2003
(DNF and DQ not included, but for the record AUS had 0)
CW was last in 15
OUA was last in 13
QSSF was last in 4
AUS was last in 2.

Big margins of defeat between last and second last (>3%):

CW had 6
OUA had 2
QSSF had 1
AUS had 0

I know the rest of the country doesn't see what happens behind the scenes but the AUS sets high standards for its athletes and those who show up deserve to be there. They've proven it year after year.

The 4x800m started this all so let me ask this: What was McM best pre OU's. They ran a hell of race and deserve high kudos, but do Ontario schools believe they are the only ones capable of dropping when they finally have their best lineup and are in a meaningful race with serious competition. 8:07 to 7:53. Awesome run. Dal's at 8:01 and have yet to run their best lineup. Can they come down by as much? I don't know but that's why we have a national championship. What I do know is that if Dal is entered they have good reason to suspect they'll be competitive and history has proven that, 9 times out of 10, they are!