Dalton Charest
Equinox Staff
The Keene State College men’s and women’s track and field teams have mixed emotions after the national qualifying standards were changed at the Division Three NCAA level this season.
For the track and field athletes here at Keene State College and all of Division III, the “security blanket” of hitting a certain mark throughout the season to go to nationals has been taken away. That security blanket has been thrown in the oven and set to fire with the NCAA changing the standards in the past off-season.
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Andrea Walsh, a senior who runs the three and five kilometer races for the KSC women’s track and field team, commented on the recent changes in standards and how they’ve changed her mental awareness as an athlete.
“I just think one of the bad things is that all season we looked at those times and if some people actually made those times we kind of felt that security and now it’s like our security blanket’s gone,” Walsh said.
Head Throwing Coach, John Napolitano of the KSC men’s and women’s track teams is a 2008 graduate of KSC and former All-Little East Conference performer in the hammer throw. Napolitano said the changes to the national qualification standards have been installed at the NCAA Division III level for the 2011-2012 seasons.
“There used to be provisional and automatic marks,” Napolitano said. “The problem that was happening was that people were hitting the mark very early in the season and they could literally almost take the rest of the year off until nationals if they wanted to.”
In previous years, track and field athletes could hit an automatic or provisional mark early in the season no matter when or where.
Automatically following the action of hitting that mark, their plane ticket would be booked and they were going to nationals.
Now, the NCAA has chosen to do away with those marks and go with a descending order list with the top 50 athletes per event which could change every week throughout the season.
What happens now, in result, is that athletes must be consistent with their performances every track meet to be eligible for a spot at nationals.
For the coaches and athletes alike, they say this doesn’t affect the way the way they perform and train through the season.
Long-time Head Coach Peter Thomas of both Keene State track and field teams is now in his 28th season and the receiver of multiple coach-of-the-year awards at both the Division II and Division III levels. Coach Thomas didn’t raise many concerns about the recent changes but most importantly how it doesn’t affect the way he coaches his program.
“For coaches who have been around awhile, it’s not much difference because we know what’s a quality performance and what’s going to get a kid to nationals or the very top layer,” Thomas said. “ It doesn’t change things for us because you know I’ve been here for a long time and I can tell what’s good and what’s not.”
Napolitano agreed with Thomas.
“I don’t think it changed a whole lot,” Napolitano said. “The way we train, we peak for certain parts of the season and we’re still going to be peaking for those certain parts. But I think mentally it just changes some things.”
The new national qualification standards system that has been implemented for the athletes seems a bit more bothersome then previous years’ standards.
“I think for the athletes it’s a bit more nerve-racking,” junior distance runner, Thomas Paquette, said. “It’s a different mindset now with every time you run.”
“I don’t think the new qualifying standards change us athletes,” junior distance runner, Maggie Fitter, said. “The only thing it really changes is that we’re not given a certain time that we have to hit and so we don’t have that security all season of actually going to nationals.”
The style of the way both the coaches and athletes train, as well as compete, hasn’t and won’t change.
With consistent success in the KSC track and field program year after year, both with the women’s and men’s groups, the program has no reason to change the way they compete.
Napolitano said his only concern was the way he prepared his athletes not only physically, but mentally as well.
“I think this year we kind of had to push a little harder so people understand that every meet counts and there’s no hit the number and then take a break for a while,” Napolitano said. “It’s more of you having to push your athlete more mentally then physically at times.”
Both track and field teams have a very important weekend ahead of them as they travel to Dartmouth College.
Dalton Charest can be contacted at dcharest@ksc.mailcruiser.com