Photos by Eric Taylor (Cooper Teare), DeAnna Turner (Liam Anderson/Matt Strangio), Lizette Adams (Spencer Dodds/Isaac Cortes).
---
SKIP THE WORDS. GO STRAIGHT TO THE VOTING!
It's not a tournament until there's an upset ... or three. It's inevitable. The Greatest Boys Combined Distance Runner of the Decade poll tournament is no exception.
After first-round voting, five "lower seeds" advanced to the second round. While the top four group all advanced, only half of the next eight moved on.
On the pages that follow, find a breakdown of first-round results, second-round runner bios, and second-round voting (closes Friday night).
Your votes decide who advances to the quarterfinals. ...
What Is This?
This is a poll tournament where your votes determined the greatest distance runner of the past decade.
The Setup
We selected 32 guys based on combined distance times, ranked them in groups, placed them in a bracket of head-to-head matchups where your poll votes on the pages below will determine who advances. Early-round voting will last 60-72 hours.
Parameters
Athletes included are from the period between 2010 and 2019. This is based solely on track times and results without regard to XC. Runners were selected based on top 800/1600, 1600/3200 and 800/3200 combined rankings within the decade with equal weight given to results at the State Meet. Single-distance-event specialists that do not rank among the top tier of either of the three combined event PR options, were only considered to fill out the 32-runner bracket. As a result, all 1600m and 3200m State Meet champions in the decade are included but not all 800m champions. The final cut to 32 was subjective.
How This Works
Athletes are seeded in groups of fours based roughly on combined rankings with strong consideration to those with multiple State Meet results. Runners are listed alphabetically within their group. In most cases, bracket pairings are based on positioning within the group: 1 vs. 4, 2 vs. 3. Scan through the bios on Page 3 and then click "Next" for Page 4 to vote and send your favorites into the next round!