.png)
The Red Banner Race Report
Featuring and celebrating NAIA cross country/track and field athletes, coaches, and supporters. This podcast is an independent production and is not affiliated with, endorsed, or sponsored by the NAIA.
The Red Banner Race Report
NAIA XC/TF Central
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Welcome back to the Red Banner Race Report Podcast, where we feature and celebrate the amazing moments, mindsets, and miles of cross country and track and field within the NAIA.
If you’re an NAIA middle-to-long distance athlete, coach, fan, supporter, or even quite possibly one outside the NAIA, you know that the Instagram account NAIA XC/TF Central is the go-to source for in-depth pre-to-post season predictions, coverage, rankings, race reports, analysis, and more. With the first Instagram post going live on June 15, 2024, to expand on their NAIA LetsRun threads, the account billed as “The Premiere Hub for NAIA XC and TF news” now has 12 admin contributors and over 3500 followers, growing each day. In a division that often takes a back seat to the publicity of the NCAA, the awareness of the NAIA has rapidly risen along with the quality of the athletes’ performances. In fact, some of the top NAIA athletes rival some of the best the NCAA has to offer, albeit in smaller numbers. Join two of the account’s crew, Corban Phillips and Mike Reif, to get the inside scoop on all things cross country and track and field in the NAIA.
Follow RBRR on Instagram @redbannerracereport
Hello, and welcome back to the Red Banner Race Report podcast, where we feature and celebrate the amazing moments, mindsets, and miles of cross country and trek and field within the NAIA. I'm your host, Marin, and if you're a middle to long distance athlete, coach, fan, supporter, or even quite possibly one even outside the NAIA, you know that the Instagram account NAIA Cross Country and Track and Field Central is the go-to source for in-depth pre-to-post season predictions, coverage, rankings, race reports, analysis, and more. With the first Instagram post going live on June 15th in 2024, expanding other NAI Let's Run threads, the account billed as, quote, the premier hub for NAI Cross Country and Track and Field News now has 12 admin contributors and over 3,500 followers, growing each day. In a division that often takes the backseat to the publicity of the NCAA, the awareness of the NAIA has rapidly risen along with the quality of athletes' performances. In fact, some of the top NAIA athletes rival some of the best the NCAA has to offer, albeit in smaller quantities. Join two of the accounts crew, Corbin and Mike, to get the inside scoop on all things cross-country and track and field in the NAIA. Welcome to the Red Banner Race Report, NAI Track and Field Central, or should I say cross-country track and field central. And tonight we have Mike and Corbin, and they're going to introduce themselves and then tell us about the rest of the crew.
SPEAKER_03All right, sweet. Thank you so much for having us. We're stoked to be here. It's a lot of fun being in this group and getting to just get to cover the sport that we love in this division that we all were part of. Yeah, we've got a great group. We have 12 current admin on the team, uh, three of which are current athletes. So they're going to remain anonymous. Obviously, there's Mike and myself. Uh, and then our group that really looks at the cross-country side of things and the distance side of track also includes Blake Hipkiss, Cameron Nocton, Jaden Maxfield, and Winston Telford. And then on the track side of things, we have Cole Bennett and Drew Bryant. And then helping me with graphics is Carly Gregg.
SPEAKER_00All right. Uh, well, what inspired this group? And I'm assuming it's probably evolved and grown as the account has as well. So, what inspired you, whoever that may be, the founder or the beginning, you know, the origin story? What inspired you to launch this account? And how long approximately have you been, you know, just kind of covering the NAIA, looking at collegiate tracking cross-country and the media coverage from this angle?
SPEAKER_02So we kind of have a funny story that we found out the other day. Um start of last year during cross-country season, uh, the guy who made the account post-mots run. He was like, hey, if this gets a certain amount of upvotes, uh, I'll come back. But I probably need some help. So he reached out to some people, I think, or I I know I reached out to him and was like, hey, I'll be involved. Um, but we all started some group chat, and he was initially in it, and then we moved it to a different platform, and we have not heard from him since. So we actually have zero idea who started the account. Oh. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00It's kind of a mysterious beginning.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So he did a really good job of uh staying anonymous. There are a lot of theories that it was like some of the guys who are actually on the account right now, but as far as we know, it was not anybody who's currently involved. Um at least for myself, getting involved was something like I I followed it so close um since I started even considering looking at NAI schools back when I was in high school. It was kind of like, hey, why not? Um if I'm already looking at this so close and you know, I'm looking at the stuff on Letrun all the time, and I'm looking at Tfers all the time, why not help try and make this more accessible? Um there's very few other outlets that give it any attention whatsoever, and most of them are behind a paywall. So I think being able to help out and let people see this division and what it could bring for you for free um was a big thing for me.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, uh just to add on to that, yeah, obviously it's a funny founding uh story, but yeah, all the guys that are in this group and and the ladies uh definitely are statistical-minded people. Uh, we just love doing this. We are students of the sport, and so it's a really natural fit. But yeah, we we want the NAI to be something that uh is talked about and that people are able to see the cool things that are happening because it is a really special place. And so um also just the fact that we felt like there needed to be another voice in the ranking atmosphere, whereas sometimes we felt the coach's polls weren't fully accurate, we were able to give another perspective in that area.
SPEAKER_00Well, how do you go about tracking thousands of athletes across dozens of NAIA conferences each week? I mean, we've got pre-season, we've got in-season, we've got postseason. How do you aggregate all of that data? How do you make sure you're covering what you think are the noteworthy marks or the performances? And then where are you finding your best sources of information in most cases to be able to make your predictions and your analysis?
SPEAKER_02Uh it takes all of us working pretty hard on this. I wouldn't necessarily say hard, but always kind of looking at Tfers, looking at athletic and keeping up with things on Instagram. Um really the results is honestly the easy part because they're they're not too hard to find, you know. You got your handful of live results um websites, and then Tfers and Athletic are pretty good about you know, it at the college level, usually things are up uh up within a day or two. The recruiting aspect is the difficult one in kind of figuring out, you know, what's happening with certain teams, why do they run one way or another? That's been where it's um it's really helped, I think, that we have a handful of people who are really dedicated to this because we broke it down conference by conference, um in terms of our recruiting and putting um what our roster projections or top seven projections would look like. And it still took us I'd say about a month to get it done. Um, so it was a lot of looking on Instagram, um, looking at team rosters and a whole bunch of other stuff, reaching out to certain people. It it took a lot. Um, we have a huge uh Google Sheet spreadsheet. We've got a group chat that I feel like we talk in every day. So yeah, it's been a a lot, and I think we're still evolving with it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, definitely a team effort, and it helps that we have so many admin that are so committed to it. Uh, I I also think this year we've gotten a lot more organized, like Mike mentioned with the Google Sheets. Uh, we're able to look ahead and know what races are coming up and what teams are gonna be there, uh, figuring out who's gonna be racing when and if they're racing their full squad or not. And so the organization piece I think has helped a lot this year, which has allowed us to really produce a lot more content, which I think people are enjoying. Uh, and really that's our goal to be able to cover it as well as we can and as much as we can.
SPEAKER_00I know you'll have to speak probably personally or individually to this question, but how much time would you estimate that you are spending weekly to prepare this content and gather stats and content that's being produced and put out onto Instagram?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, I was gonna say the exact same thing. It definitely varies based on the season. If we have a big meet coming up that requires a big preview, that's gonna take more effort than you know, just a regular weekend. And uh, I'm in a unique situation that I'm making graphics uh and also helping with some of the rankings. And so if I have a template already made, that's very different than I have to make a new one. And so I would say on average it's probably 10 hours a week for me, but again, that fluctuates pretty greatly.
SPEAKER_02And I think the part of having all the admin with this year, like I gotta give a lot of credit to Winnie lately, they've been awesome. Like I started, I'm a special ed teacher. I started a new job uh pretty recently. So I've been like slammed with work, and you would not guess that we've had me doing less work than usual if you look at the content that we put out, um, with how hard they've been pulling their weight.
SPEAKER_00Well, I was asking Corbin before we got rolling on the questions, like, hey, what's your day job and what do you do? Because none of you are doing this as your primary career, but I'm sure it probably feels like that sometimes with just the time commitment and just the amount of effort you're putting forth into this. So when you look back at the start of the page compared to now, what has surprised you the most about the growth of your audience?
SPEAKER_03I think there's a lot of trust that has been gained. Um, initially, people are wondering what is this page? Do they really know what they're talking about? What's the reason to follow them? Uh, and through the consistency of just producing good content that is accurate and gives good projections, people have realized that it's a solid source for them to hear about all things in AI, across country and track and field. And so, yeah, I'm really proud of uh just the way that we've built that, the way that we actually have influence and impact in that space now. Um for my piece, I I primarily work with graphics. And so my big goal was to help elevate the page to uh just have more excellence, to look more professional and and really highlight these athletes in a meaningful way.
SPEAKER_00Well, this is a good segue into my next question, which is are the teams and athletes usually pretty open to sharing and are they forthcoming with information, or do you have some instances where you have to do a little digging and prodding, or maybe they're just like shutting it down and saying we're not sharing that?
SPEAKER_02I'd say a mix of both for the most part. Um when we ask something, we do get an answer. Um, sometimes there are coaches that are like, hey, here's here is the answer, but maybe don't post this on your story or make a post. And like uh, like Corbin said, like there's a big trust piece of this. We're not gonna go against that. Um but yeah, I'd say for the most part, people do give us information pretty freely. Um there is some extent where it's we usually are the ones reaching out. There's one coach who's really good about reaching out to us, and he tells us things ahead of time. We've got a couple athletes that are really good about telling us what's going on with their programs, and that makes it a lot easier. If you're anyone listening who's currently in NAI and you want to see our page give better content and better information, please reach out as much as possible. But yeah, I'd say when we reach out, we usually do get a response. Um, very rarely do we get shot down. Um, if anything, it's just getting left on rod.
SPEAKER_00We all know that social media can have its moments of how shall I phrase this? Uh, toxicity, shall we say? And I'm sure that, you know, runners are a pretty friendly, welcoming, inclusive group, generally speaking. But I'm gonna guess that there have been some times that you've had maybe less than positive response on something, or someone has a very strong opinion and maybe they express that in a not so kind way. So, how do you handle like a hot topic item? So maybe a national ranking doesn't fall the way people thought it should, or they don't agree with the prediction that you've made, or hey, you didn't mention so-and-so, um, which by the way, is impossible to get everyone. You just you're gonna miss someone, it's gonna happen. That's not like a negative thing, it's just being human. Um, so do you find that, you know, when you have those moments, there isn't too much controversy, or have there been some moments where you've really just had to um maybe, you know, dance around something carefully?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think it's really easy when it comes to a ranking or prediction to take things personally. Uh, that's a very natural response. And so when we see a little bit of heat behind a comment or a response, uh, what we've found is really the most successful is just showing the athlete that we're on their side because we really want the best for each of these athletes. We want people to be successful. Um, we want people to prove our predictions wrong and just absolutely crush it. Uh, and and like you said, we're not gonna be able to get everyone. There's only so many people that we can rank to be all Americans. And so, um, yeah, just letting athletes know that, hey, like we're not against you. This isn't an attack on you. We actually want you to succeed. We just didn't happen to pick you for this one time. And typically when we respond in that way, they they're able to cool down a little bit and realize that life will go on.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I will say, uh parents have been like surprisingly very supportive. Um, I always thought we'd see like more angry parents on here. Every time we get a message from a parent, I'd say 99% of the time, it's you know, maybe you missed one thing. What do you think about this guy? Then followed up with like, we love what you do. Um so we I really don't think we've seen many angry parents, which has been very surprising.
SPEAKER_00Well, what are your long-term goals or things that you would like to do? You know, perfect world, you've got the manpower, woman power, you've got the time, you've, you know, got this perfect scenario to add something to what you're doing, what would you hope to see?
SPEAKER_03I would love to see more on-site coverage. I think that's really the next step for us to really take this page to the next level. Um, obviously, the NAI is all the way across the nation and into the nation to our north. Uh, but if we can continue adding admin and key spots that are gonna be at these big meets, I think that would just be uh a really cool way for us to continue to highlight uh different athletes and teams through interviews and race coverage. Um, so yeah, I think that's really the the next big thing for us.
SPEAKER_00That would be very cool. So I know that some questions were thrown out. Hey, why don't you cover sprints? Why don't you cover field events? Um if you want to speak to that, I think I know the answer, but if you want to share why, then we'll let you have the floor on that.
SPEAKER_02So we did add someone who covers throws. Um, and we do have one person that covers sprints. The issue is there are a ton of sprints, especially indoor. And for one person, I can't imagine doing all that work. Uh when that guy has done every single sprint event, I mean, I think he did it all for guys indoor. That was a ton of work for him. Um, you know, more power to him, but that's that's really hard. If he were to double it and do all guys and girls, like I don't know how we'd get a ton. Um so we are trying to get better with that. The reason why most of our admin, which is distance-based, doesn't do it is if we put something out, we want it to be good. Like we we don't want it to make content that's inaccurate or something that I'm not totally knowledgeable on. I can't tell you too much about 60 hurdles. Um I I cannot give you full write-up on 60 hurdles the same way I could for a 5k. That's not to say I'm always accurate in a 5K, but I will be way more inaccurate in 60 hurdles. So if we're gonna do something, we want to do it right and we want to make it high quality.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and the other side of the of the coin is uh graphically, right? We're multiplying the work. Uh, I do, you know, about 95 to 99% of the graphics for this team. And indoors, when we did try and cover sprints, I know I was up till you know three, four in the morning while I'm trying to coach athletes at the indoor national championship, which just uh is not sustainable and and not what we're looking for. And so, like Mike said, we just need to add more admin if we're gonna cover those spaces. And we've put asks out before on the story uh and just have not gotten a lot of people interested. And so if you want that, if you're passionate about covering sprints or throws, um anything, you just need to reach out to us. We would be happy to see if you'd be the right fit to join our team.
SPEAKER_02And ideally, like somebody else to help Corbin with graphics because he's our guy for graphics, like he said, 95 to 99 percent. And when we're at our busiest is when he's at his busiest with coaching. Um, I don't want us to take away from the most important days of his actual job uh for something that he does for free. So graphics would be another big thing that we need a little extra help on.
SPEAKER_00Where are you primarily getting the images? I know you're not at the meets taking them. So are teams just sharing them with you? Are you pulling them from their media pages? How does that work that you are able to grab some really awesome pictures of some athletes?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you have to get really creative with it.
SPEAKER_00How's that?
SPEAKER_03Um yeah, there's some meets that I am at, and so I have my own images, which is great. And, you know, indoor nationals. I I took a lot of photos there that we were able to use as well. Um, but yeah, you can find the right uh spaces within uh Teams athletic pages that have images. Um, you know, a classic Google search will get some of it done. And then, yeah, of course, there's there's people sharing as well. We had um a couple parents reach out recently actually and share, you know, their photographers. And so they're sharing their photos they've taken of the teams that their uh uh children are on. And so yeah, if if you have great photos and you want to send them in, we will take them for sure. Uh, but yeah, we've definitely had to get creative on finding them and making sure we're using high-quality images.
SPEAKER_00Let's dive into some NAI opinions. So, first question in that subcategory is what was one of the biggest surprises or unexpected outcomes that you have seen in competition throughout your coverage so far? And if you have two different incidences for both of you, that's fine as well. Um, and it could be something that was, you know, recent, or it could be, you know, from when you were an athlete, something that just kind of caught you by surprise.
SPEAKER_02For me, the biggest surprise was definitely while I was competing. Um I it was a race I was in. Uh, it was 2023 cross-country nets up in Vancouver. And this year, with us being in Vancouver another year, we reference it all the time. There are just non-stop, um, huge surprises in Vancouver. Like it's just made for upsets. Um, that race was probably the it had the best team I've seen on the men's side in the NAIA by far over the past few years, uh, since I've been paying attention. Indiana Wesleyan looked like a bad day. They'd lose with 80 or they'd win with about 80 points. I didn't even think losing was in the question. I was about 6k in, and I realized like, oh man, they only got like one or two guys ahead of me. I was like, whoa. So that was a shock because not only did they not win, they took fifth. Um Milligan is just incredible on that course. Same thing with St. Mary. So maybe those are two teams to look out for outperforming uh projections this year, being on that course. But I just could not believe that um Milligan ended up winning that and ended up winning it with like I think 93 points, and St. Mary was not very far off. Uh the individual race was also a shock. I think everybody thought it would be between uh Robert Swoboda and Imad Bashir Mohammed, and Jackson Wilson ended up winning that. And I think like two years ago on that course, I beat Jackson Wilson. So that was a huge shock to me. In terms of things that we've covered, I think um Luis Peralta's upset in the 800 this year over over Nathan Kremen, that was a huge one. So I guess like The common theme is Milligan pulling random things off that nobody saw happening. Um, but yeah, that was a huge one for me because there was a lot of talk, especially in our DMs, about like, hey, do you do you guys think that Nathan Kreman will break this record? And then Luis Peralta somehow ends up beating him. So that was a huge one.
SPEAKER_03I'll go back to uh Indoor Nationals this last year. Uh Heidi Helt taking down Katie Woods in the mile was just a spectacular performance. Uh, I think most people thought Katie kind of had that one in the bag. Um, but Heidi ran incredible. She covered every single move, just denied her the entire race, which is super taxing to do. And so that was super impressive to get to watch in person.
SPEAKER_00I would add that it was also impressive to see Katie come back and win another championship, like an hour and a half later.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_00She was just a beast that meet. Oh my gosh. Well, in your opinion or opinions, what do you think is the biggest misconception that people outside the NAIA have about competition within the NAI division?
SPEAKER_02Straight up, I'd say it's the quality of front-end talent that we have. Um every year the the top end is just unbelievable. Just in my time in the NAI, um, I ran against Zuharatalby, who's been an Olympian, um Lucas Santorum, who is now at Texas AM, and his teammate who broke four in the mile while in the NAI, Youssef Aslow. Um Everett Silva is like what a 1320-ish 5k guy. It seems like there's one of these guys every year. Uh Mohammed Gulada is coming in this year. He's a 1337 5k guy, and that's not his best event. Uh woman's side, you've had Addie Wiley, uh Janie Halterman, Emily Kearney, um really just incredible top-end athletes. Emily Dalaville was phenomenal. Nathan Kreiman this year, another one. And that's not even touching the sprint side. Sprint side's been like head and shoulders above distance. Um I've been to nationals and seen guys break 10 in the 100. Like never when I was getting recruited, did I ever think I would be in person seeing people break 10 in the 100, especially not people in the NAI. And then when I tell people that, who, you know, my assistant coach or one of the assistant coaches I work with this year, uh he he said something, he's like, Oh, I heard you were an all-American, and he's like asking me my PRs. I told him 1435 is my 5k PR. He was he was shocked. He's like, Oh, I knew you're an all-American, but I just thought it was in the NAI. He he assumed that I like won with that time. I told him, like, dude, I I got eighth, but I got lapped. And I only got eighth because I outleaned a kid who did a 5k, 3k double with prelims. So people are not aware of how good the front end town in the NAI is.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it seems to keep getting so fast every year. Like you just look at what it takes to be an all-American, and you know, one year you could win with that time, and another year you might not even get into the final. So it's just exponentially increasing. Trackflation, I guess, is the term people throw out.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Well, looking at that 1435 I ran, it if I ran that almost any other year, I'd be top three. And then I was eighth, and again, I leaned a guy out, and I only got that because he decided to double. You know, any other year I would have been third. And it's only gonna keep getting faster.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah, I think we're also gonna start seeing the trickle down from the NCAA ruling where people are gonna choose NAIA instead. And um that's just gonna, you know, make the uh pool of talent a little more diverse, I think. Well, if you could change one thing or improve one thing about the NAI, whether it be in track and field or cross country, what is something that you would like to see get better?
SPEAKER_02I would go with the qualifying in the way that it works for both track and cross country. Um the last few years with the the top 20 to get automatically in has somehow ended up like diluting the fields more. I don't really know how that happened, but uh we've gotta work out some system because it seems like the 19th and 20th entries every year, um, especially for indoor have really fallen off a cliff. Like you're seeing guys who are four flat for the top end in the mile, and then the back end guys are in the four twenties, which is slower than it was before they changed these standards to get so fast. Um that's what I'm referring to, by the way. The the standards have gotten so fast, they're having to take the 20th guy and the 20th guys further back the 20th century. Right. And then cross-country qualifying. I think people do complain about this a little bit too much. It only really does affect a few teams, but Corbin's team got probably the worst luck I've ever seen with it last year. Um they clearly should have been in, and because we don't have regionals and you just have to qualify through your conference meet, if you're in the Cascade and you know, the Cascade doesn't get to go compete against other teams that often because they're geographically isolated. Unless you have a ton of money, you can't come fly in for Great Lakes, you can't come fly in for uh Appalachian. If you're underrated to start the year, it's really hard to move up in that conference, and we see teams that are potentially top 20 uh nationals get left out for teams that you know they might have the seven of the back ten scorers, um seven of the the last ten places. So I think people complain about that a little bit too much. But that is my one biggest complaint about the NAI. And I know it's not an easy answer because the money issues of having regionals, because again, if if the cascade's really isolated, hey, how are they gonna make a re uh regional to include all the cascade teams and then a couple teams that uh are from other conferences, it would be rough, but there has to be some system that's a little bit better than this, even if our regionals only included, or even if we had like 10 regionals, you know, it would be a little bit better than this.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, speaking to that same issue, uh I think something that could really help in that area is uh having stricter regulations for the conference raiders. Um, it's pretty apparent that a handful of raiders are pretty lazy. Uh, just looking at the preseason rankings this year, there are teams that are got ranked similar to how they finished last year, even though their team makeup is completely different and and they're not the same team. And so if those raiders were regulated a little more strictly, I think we would um see the teams that deserve to be at nationals more frequently actually be there on the back end. And like Mike said, it it really does only uh affect a couple of teams that are on that bubble of making it or not. Uh, but I do think having better raters helps that problem.
SPEAKER_00Do you think the NAIA will ever adopt the five for five model, like the NCA?
SPEAKER_02I don't think it will be exactly the same. I think they will give you five years of eligibility. I think it would be something similar to what they have right now with the 10 terms rule, where you can only be in college for 10 terms. But I think that the NAI knows they get a lot of really high quality athletes um that aren't traditional college age, and they would lose on they would lose out on not only those athletes coming to the specific schools in the NAI and their enrollment possibly dropping, but also the publicity. Um a lot of those runners I mentioned earlier, Zuhara Talby was 27 while in that AI, Everett Silva, I think, was 26. I can't remember how old Emily Kearney was. But uh I might even be wrong about Emily Kearney, she might actually have been traditional college age. But um so many of these really high quality athletes that we've seen throughout the years have been a little bit older, and that brings a ton of attention to the NAI of if we wanted to be exactly like the NCAA, it would be NCAA D4, you know. Maybe we shouldn't have to be completely like them. I know that's a controversial statement. A lot of people hate not having age limits. I'm not gonna state my opinion on if I like them or not, but I don't think you have an age limit.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I agree with that. I I think there's too high of a population of people outside um that traditional college age that it wouldn't make sense for the NAI. The closest thing I think I could see the NAI adopting is a five for five starting when you enter college, which doesn't necessarily have to be at a certain age. Um, but yeah, there's just too many athletes that are older trying to get a college degree later in life, that are on teams that I don't think the NAI would fully adopt that model.
SPEAKER_00Well, this is more of a fun question, not so serious about policy or eligibility. But if you could add one event to the NAI track and field nationals, whether it be indoor or outdoor, what is something that you would like to see on the championship lineup?
SPEAKER_03I would definitely go with an outdoor four by mile. I think a distance relay for outdoors on the track would be awesome. It would give some great opportunity to teams that uh have some good depth, but maybe not the same top-end talent. I think we see a lot of teams who are consistently really strong in cross-country, but don't actually see a lot of individuals qualify on the track. And so creating a distance relay for outdoors could create an opportunity for teams like that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, Corbin kind of took mine. Uh for the exact reason that he said there was my sophomore year at St. Francis, we had three guys who ran either, or we had four guys who were either 413 in the mile or faster, or 352 in the 15 or faster. And they were not very good in the eight. Would have been really fun to see them in a four by mile. Um also with how good the sprint side is, I think seeing a four by two would be pretty cool. The the times they could throw down in that would be awesome. So either of those two would be really cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, four by mile would be very interesting. Um, I imagine the lap counting would get a little tricky on that one, maybe, but hopefully it doesn't end up the way the DMR did at Indoor Nationals where they ran an extra lap. Yikes.
SPEAKER_03I will say I was a high school coach before coaching college, and both four by miles that my teams participated in had lap counting issues.
SPEAKER_00Somebody's gonna like your answer. I don't know who it'll be, but who, in your opinion, has the best uniform design in the NAI?
SPEAKER_02I think Huntington's are pretty cool. Um I like the the color concepts for like Grace in Southern Oregon, too. Um I think some of St. Mary's national jerseys were really cool. Yeah, those would be my my big ones. The St. Mary ones with the Tackers. I thought those were cool.
SPEAKER_03I was actually gonna say St. Mary's as well, so we're we're thinking the same there.
SPEAKER_00Okay, in agreement. All right, shout out to them. They get the fashion award. Well, we had a couple of questions from uh people that follow you on Instagram, and we pulled a few that we thought were the most relevant to our conversation. So here's one. What unranked teams or athletes would you consider an underdog or a dark horse?
SPEAKER_02In terms of teams, if if we're going off of the coaches' ratings, um if we're counting receiving votes for unranked, I'll go with Corbin's team. I think Northwest is extremely underrated, especially if a few of his guys are like right back to where they were in cross. I think Northwest has top 15 upside. Um the big one compared to our rankings, it's different, is UT Southern. They've had like one little issue to start the year, but if if they're running their best and everyone's fully healthy, we had them ranked seven. I think they have upside of like a trophy team. They they have three guys who legit look like they can be top 20 in that. Um, four and five are a bit of an issue, but uh yeah, those those would be my two, it'd be Northwest and UT Southern.
SPEAKER_03I'm also gonna go with a West Coast school and I'll shout out Lewis Clark State. Uh, they're a really young team, uh, but they look strong. They look like if they continue progressing, could be really good. Uh likely they have zero shot at making it to nationals just being in the Cascade Conference and how brutal it is, uh, unless they take down my team, which I hope they don't.
SPEAKER_00Remains to be seen, right? We'll keep an eye on that.
SPEAKER_02Uh in terms of individuals, I will say we probably deserve to give one person a shout out after how well he ran last week. Carson Milner has got like no attention, even from us, put on a really good show. Um uh took second at I Wood Twilight. He beat a national champion, so yeah, he probably deserves some individually. Then on the women's side, I I gotta give like some homer stuff to the St. Francis girls. We've got like three or four that have like top 20 potential this year. So and they got very little attention. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Well, I'm sure it's really hard to predict. I mean, you don't know till they race. You've got a long summer of training and really nothing to go on other than if they ran last year. So yeah, that's that's gotta be tricky to try to get it all figured out. Well, the next question says, What are your thoughts on the marathon? And I'm assuming this is regarding the NAI national marathon. I could be wrong, but we'll go with that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I I like it. I think um the NAI is different from the NCAA. And so having things like the marathon that really differentiate ourselves and create different types of opportunities is is a really positive thing. Um, there are downsides when it comes to trying to juggle cross country and the marathon and track uh now that they've moved it uh to be right at the end of the year. Um, and so that can be difficult, but I do think it plays to different people's strengths. We see people who just are not strong track athletes who can really do well in the marathon with those longer distances. So I'm a fan.
SPEAKER_00All right, we're gonna do a little this or that segment. We'll have Corbin go first, Mike. You can follow, um, just get to know you kind of questions, like what your personality is like. So, first, track or trails. Would you pick, let's say, an 800 on the track or an 8K on a cross-country course?
SPEAKER_03That is such a hard question. I love both of those races so much, uh, but I am gonna have to say 8k on cross-country course just because there's the team aspect.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna have to agree. Um, I like covering cross-country more personally because of the team aspect. And I was an awful 800 runner um and did solid in the 8k. So I'm gonna go with Corbin all day on that one.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Personal preference. All right, sub-4 or a sub-14. So watching a sub-4 mile or a sub-14 5K.
SPEAKER_03Both are super fun. Uh I'm gonna seem like I'm just a super distance heavy guy, but I'm gonna have to go sub-14. I think uh the entire time watching a race like that, there's just that potential of someone blowing up and you don't know if they're gonna do it. But to see them follow through the entire 12 and a half laps is something special.
SPEAKER_02I'll have to go with the sub-4 mile. Um, it's accomplished a lot less. And like I it's just so iconic breaking four in the mile. Uh, in terms of people in that AI who've done it, really short list. So I'd have to go sub-four in the mile.
SPEAKER_00Weather pick. Would you go with a hot and humid 10K or a cold and windy 5k?
SPEAKER_03I uh very easily get heat stroke. It happened to me multiple times in college, and so I'm definitely gonna have to go with a cold and windy.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna have to go the opposite. I'm gonna go hot and humid 10K. I raced really bad at indoor or at outdoor nationals every year, except for the year that I ran a 10K and Gulf Shores in the real field was like 95. Yeah. So I'm going with my hot and humid 10K.
SPEAKER_00All right. Well, I guess if you have the hot and humid, you don't have wind. So there's that, I suppose. That's that's not working against you. Um, okay, so this is a tricky one because I think they each have their own unique characteristics. But best meet vibe, would you go with indoor, outdoor, or cross country nationals?
SPEAKER_03Personally, I'm gonna have to go with cross country. I love that the spectators are so engaged with it, they're running across the course trying to cheer people on, uh, a lot of energy, um, and there's just more space to breathe, which is nice.
SPEAKER_02I have to totally agree. Uh, cross country is like so for me, like so far above everything else. Um whether it's running at that national meet, like being in it, and like whenever they have those team scores flash up, like that's really cool to see. Um, it's just such a long race, there's so much happening. I love running on the grass way more. But I'll say indoor nationals is really fun too. Um agreed. The the spectator side and all the different events you see. That's a really fun one with keeping up with team score too. I I've always thought that indoor nets was a lot more fun than outdoor, even though outdoor probably is the more important one.
SPEAKER_00Uh did you think that the course in Florida last fall was interesting, or are you more excited to see it return to somewhere like that?
SPEAKER_03I uh I liked the course. Um, we'll be back there in two years. Um I didn't expect it to run as slow as it did. That was a little bit of a surprise. I think humidity played a factor since nobody's really used to that during the fall. Um, but I do think it forced people to be really tough. Uh, we saw a lot of exchanges in the front end for taking the lead, which was super exciting. Uh, I had a guy get all American for the first time in cross country, so that was super fun. Um, but I did like the Florida course.
SPEAKER_02I'd have to agree, yeah. Um, I love Hilly courses, and I think that Vancouver is the most true cross-country course out there. But I I think whenever admin Winnie he said that course is about as wide as his bedroom, and that's pretty accurate. Um it's not easy to move up on that course, so I'll say Florida. I wish we had a really nice cross-country course that was hilly for nationals sometimes, but yeah.
SPEAKER_00Well, I ran my national meet in uh Wisconsin. So yes. So I wish we could have run there. And that was the same every year, my entire career, and for many years prior to my career. And then I believe I graduated in 01, and I think either the next year or two years after they started moving it, you know, rotating it by location. But it had been there for a long time, and that is a very hard course. So I was like, dang it, figures I graduate, go somewhere else. But it tested, yeah, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, three of my four national cross-country races that I personally competed in were in Vancouver, and that was that was brutal.
SPEAKER_00Mm-hmm. I've heard it's hard. I have not run it or seen it, so I can only, you know, hear it through the eyes of the people that have experienced it. But yeah, I've heard it's it's pretty challenging. Well, the last question I have for both of you gentlemen is if you could run with anyone and you can pick someone that is either from the past in history, they may not even be living anymore, they could be from present day, and you could take them on a run and you could go anywhere in the world. Who would you choose to run with and where would you choose to go?
SPEAKER_03My high school coach had a huge impact on me. Um, I would love to, you know, go back in time when he was a little more fit, uh, and and go for a run with him, probably go out to Flagstaff, uh, hit some of the awesome trails out there with him.
SPEAKER_02That yeah, that's a really tough one for me. Um, I think I'd have to go with like some of the 60s runners in the US up in Oregon. Um, like Kree, Frank Schorer, Gary Lindgren, like up there in Eugene. That would be kind of it for me. I'd get dropped pretty early into this run, but it would be a fun time.
SPEAKER_00Well, in a perfect world, you know, you could keep up, right? Because it's uh ideal scenario. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Well, guys, it has been awesome to chat with you. And on behalf of the NAI cross country and track and field world, we are all super appreciative of the spotlight that you've been shining on the sports and the division. Um, your really hard work is not unnoticed, and we are so thankful that people are shining the light on these amazing athletes and what they're doing and just bringing an awareness to what accomplishments are, you know, possible in this division. I think a lot of people kind of get stuck in that NZAA mindset of, well, that's the only place that matters. And, you know, we've had nation or world leading times come out of the NAIA. So the quality of competition is definitely there. And um, just seeing how you are broadcasting that in a different way is really exciting. So, on the other side with the rest of your crew, make sure that they know that we are super thankful and we look forward to seeing what comes next, and we'll keep following.
SPEAKER_03All right, thank you so much for having us, and thank you for all the coverage that you do for the NAI as well.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, thank you for having us means a lot.
SPEAKER_00Thanks so much for tuning in to the Red Banner Rage Report. I can't wait to feature more cross-country and track and field athletes from the NAIA. So stay tuned because it just might be you. If you enjoyed today's podcast, please share, subscribe, and leave a review. You can find the Red Banner Rage Report podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and other major media players. You can also ask your smart speaker to play the podcast. If you have an idea for a great topic or guest you'd like to hear about, feel free to contact me through the show notes or reach out on Instagram.