The Condors lost a good bit to graduation, but their strong depth should propel them back into the top 10 in Division 1.
Cross country is right around the corner, and we're celebrating by counting down to the start of the competitive fall season! Each day (except today!) we'll release one boys team and one girls team, counting down from 30 to 1 as we approach the beginning of real XC racing.
California lost three seniors from the squad that finished 7th in Division 1 last fall, but the cupboard is far from bare in Whittier. That's because the Condors have been one of the better teams in the state for year-to-year improvement over the past three cross country seasons. Numbers from track season back that up: California had 6 returning runners under 10 minutes in the 3200. (Watch out for Quinn Estrada, who made a HUGE leap forward by running 9:41.60 that makes him a legit addition to the top 5 this fall.) Will the Condors improve enough to move into the top 5 in Division 1? That might be a tall order, but this team definitely looks like a repeat top 10 performance in 2016 is in the cards.
Ranking Data:
- Returning Team Ranking: 13th (3 Miles)
- Combined Spring Track Ranking: 21st (13th 3200, 29th 1600)
- Improvement Rating: 11th
The #CountdownToXC is a data-driven set of team rankings determined using the following information:
- Returning Team 5K & 3 Mile Rankings from 2015 XC: carries the most weight
- Returning Team 1600 and 3200 Rankings from 2015 Outdoor: less weight, but important
- Improvement Rating: a long-term statistical evaluation of how each program improves from season to season. This custom metric compares a team's final team average from each season to their returning team average from the previous season, while also accounting for how highly-ranked the team was. As we continue to improve the depth and quality of our data in California, this measure should get stronger and stronger. Improvement ratings will be the subject of a separate article in August.
- Returning team from the 2015 CIF state meet
- A little bit of "gut feeling"