Bonus Deep Dive: Cool Breeze Invitational, 2021 vs 2019

OK, so we're a week behind in wanting to break down the Cool Breeze Invitational, but better late than never. Using the Compare Meets function of the MileSplit database, we can get a thorough breakdown of the two meets quickly.

In this case, the overall average time for the 2021 edition of Cool Breeze was almost 29 seconds slower than in 2019. That's not terribly surprising given how much COVID has disrupted training and racing over the last 2 years. Participation was also down by 950 athletes this year. The top 100 runners were all just 5 - 6 seconds slower on average in 2021.

Starting from the subheading Common Athletes, the report deals only with runners that participated both years. As expected, they improved significantly on average, with the top 10% of the common athletes improving the most. This is also not surprising, as it seems likely that training for top-tier runners was more consistent during the pandemic than it was for middle-of-the-pack athletes. 

You can access Compare Meets by going to any meet page and hovering over the Meet History drop-down. Beside previous meets you will see a Compare link, and clicking it will compare the current meet to that particular historical edition. The current meet (the one whose meet page you started from) will be "this meet," and the one you click the Compare link for will be "that meet." Try it out!


Comparing the 2021 Cool Breeze Invitational to 2019 (Full Report)

Aggregate Data Points
DIFFERENCETHIS MEETTHAT MEET
Overall Athletes-95029743924
Overall Average+28.7521:52.9121:24.16
1st-10th Place+5.2914:51.8814:46.59
1st-25th Place+6.3015:01.9314:55.64
1st-50th Place+6.6615:14.6115:07.95
1st-100th Place+6.0915:30.3915:24.31
Common Athletes----686
Ran Faster294490196
Ran Season Best58266987
Average Time-40.1320:03.1820:43.30
Median Time-41.0019:20.2020:01.20
Middle 80% Times-41.9019:39.2220:21.12
Top 10% Times-1:00.0515:35.5116:35.56
Top 25% Times-58.3716:18.8717:17.24
Top 50% Times-53.0317:19.4218:12.45
Bottom 50% Times-27.2322:46.9323:14.16
Bottom 25% Times-20.4925:01.0125:21.50
Bottom 10% Times-6.0827:45.3827:51.46
Average Difference-40.13----
Median Difference-19.40----
Middle 80% Difference-42.66----
Top 10% Difference-48.73----
Top 50% Difference-48.05----
Top 25% Difference-50.31----
Top 50% Difference-48.05----
Bottom 50% Difference-32.20----
Bottom 25% Difference-28.94----
Bottom 10% Difference-12.92


Here's a small sample of the common athletes that ran in the two meets (you can see more by clicking the Full Report link above).

Performances of Common Athletes
ATHLETETEAMDIFFERENCETHIS MEETTHAT MEET
Isaiah GivensPasadena (SS)-49.9014:08.1014:58.00
Ethan GodseyAgoura (SS)-43.2014:48.3015:31.50
Jaden WileyHart (William S.) (SS)-55.4014:53.4015:48.80
Chris ColesClaremont (SS)-31.3014:55.0015:26.30
Carson SmithGreat Oak (SS)-29.9014:56.4015:26.30
Michael Camilo TorFillmore (SS)-51.3014:57.3015:48.60
Cameron SmithGreat Oak (SS)-36.9014:57.6015:34.50
Christoph WaligorskiRedondo Union (SS)+7.5015:10.5015:03.00
Tyler KaanSantiago Corona (SS)-2:02.5015:04.3017:06.80
Joseph PohlotValencia (SS)-1:53.5015:04.6016:58.10