Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / BONUS: Bob Hamer at 2024 USTFCCCA LIVE interview!

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BONUS: Bob Hamer at 2024 USTFCCCA LIVE interview! · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

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  Bonus time every year at the USTFCCCA convention down in
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  December, we do a live podcast event where we sit down with
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  coaches from around the country for 5:00-ish minutes and talk
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  about a certain topic. This year, December of 2024, we
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  sat down with coaches to talk about the NCAA.
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  What's going on with the NIL transfer portal?
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  Roster caps all. Those kind of good things, and
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  there's some interesting feedback and tidbits from
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  everyone who chose to sat down with us.
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  So here we are, the audio version of that.
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  You can catch the video version over on.
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  YouTube. Just search up the GAL Athletics
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  podcast and look for our live events content and you'll find
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  the three that we've done 20/24/2023 2020 2 and we'll do
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  it again in 2025. Who's coming down next?
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  Just push your your way past the candy guys.
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  Exactly exactly. Go ahead and scoot up just a
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  little bit for me here. The people on Twitter need to
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  see as well. Exactly, exactly.
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  Let's let's start by introducing yourself.
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  I'm the director of track and field and cross country at
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  Roger. University.
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  So you're you're my first question for you is, was it just
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  destiny you were going to coach track and field with the last
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  name of hammer? I mean, come on, you ain't
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  coaching football and tiddlywinks and basketball.
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  You you got to do track and field.
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  Yes. I don't know.
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  I kind of fumble my way into track and field, you know,
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  soccer and baseball growing up and somehow it was much better
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  at track. And field, Yeah, you know, just
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  kind. Of ended up here.
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  I love it. I love it.
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  Well, talk to us today. We're specifically talking about
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  the NCAA and all the changes right from NIL to roster caps to
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  how that trickles to D2D3, etcetera.
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  What's it look like for track meets, etcetera?
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  You get to take it any direction you'd like.
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  What's your thoughts on all the things that are going on?
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  Yeah, I mean I. Think it poses a lot of
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  challenges for a lot of people. I understand like how we've
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  gotten here, you know, NLL and. House and yeah, really important
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  but I mean it I. Think there's consequences at a
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  place like me? At a lower level, lower resource
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  Division One. Institution.
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  Where we're we're at a we're tuition.
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  Dependent. Right we're.
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  You know, we're, you know, we're struggling a little bit
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  financially and you know, I have a full roster of 120 kids.
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  You know, sometimes we get as high as 100.
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  And 30 Yeah, wow. Forward here.
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  We're going. To if we do opt in, we're going
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  to have to, you know, minimize our roster.
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  By right, 30 athletes. Yeah, and you?
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  Know that costs university money and being lower resource we're
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  not gonna you know those extra athletes are important in our
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  program. We're developmental.
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  Mm hmm. Out of those 15 kids on each
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  side, I can find four or five that are really gonna help.
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  Us out right and. Can, you know, help contribute
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  to a, you know, our hopefully winning a championship or
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  competing for a championship? So I think there are a lot of
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  effects that are that have been unintended consequences that
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  people haven't really considered or maybe they considered him
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  just discounting that they don't really care too much how it's
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  going to affect us. And you know, and I think we're
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  our athletic department and athletic director is faced with
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  a lot of really challenging decisions.
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  Sadly, I think only myself, being the director of track
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  field and our basketball coaches are the only people that I think
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  really care about it. Which is.
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  Disappointing, right? Right.
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  You know, I think we need to have a larger voice and
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  understand. Yeah, for sure.
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  Not just your program, but. The yeah, question, did you you
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  know, completely fair that you don't know the answer to this
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  because you brought this up in our previous guests and I hear
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  you guys loud and clear on our guest Mike.
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  So we're just going to keep just eat that Mike, as we talking to
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  when you talk about opting in, again, you have all right to say
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  I have no clue here, Mike. So what happens to the Division
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  One schools who don't opt in? I assume that means you
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  therefore can't compete at the NCAA Division one championship
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  because you'd have a roster of 100 versus the 45.
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  So what happens? Do we have a one AA?
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  You remember that old terminology for football from my
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  understanding. It has zero effect on whether we
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  can compete at the NC. AA OK, OK.
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  It's just. A matter of whether or not we
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  can provide NIL, NIL opportunities for our So for us
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  it's. Strictly just basketball
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  decisions for sure. Great tradition there, right?
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  Yeah. Mm.
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  Hmm. For.
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  Us is, you know, our IDs like, hey, if we don't opt in, we
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  could go from being a competitive basketball program
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  to being one of the worst in the league.
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  And and that's going to drive decisions.
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  Congrats. You made everybody happy.
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  They all say your microphone is a lot better.
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  Thank. Thank you for that.
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  Yeah. Everybody take notes on how
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  you're supposed to handle a microphone.
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  Just eat the thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  Don't worry about the hygiene aspects of this at all.
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  Just close your eyes and keep going here.
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  Thanks for the feedback on YouTube Live, by the way.
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  Appreciate that. OK, Keep going.
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  I interrupted you So. So I don't necessarily hear you
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  being a negative Nancy about this.
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  I don't hear you being the. What would it be positive,
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  Peter? I don't know.
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  Yeah. Yeah.
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  But more of just like sober realism, like, OK, some things
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  are going to change and we're going to have to figure it out
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  not only as a track team, but as an athletic department and as a
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  school. Because you, you did describe
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  something that is happening in a lot of schools that there are
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  issues because of the cost of, of colleges.
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  And so therefore attendance levels at all overall of
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  colleges are down. And that's a, that's not a very
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  good financial model for a business who's banking on, I
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  need X amount of kids and growth every year.
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  Yeah, absolutely. Especially in a place like Ryder
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  where if I, if I have a kid on the team and I have to cut him
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  for her, there's not an, there's not a student in the population
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  that can replace. See, that's where the, the, the,
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  you know that that's the difference between US and maybe
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  a different, you know, maybe a large state institution.
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  Where they can right with another.
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  Person that could come in, yeah, take that.
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  Spot. For us, this is real dollars,
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  real money. Right.
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  You know. And part of the plan they
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  they'll say is that hey, we'll, we'll take the roster spots from
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  the other sports and we'll increase, you know, they're not,
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  they're not at the roster limits right now.
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  Right, they can. Increase the rosters.
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  The challenge is they can't provide the same opportunities
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  in my opinion that we can provide track to where we can
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  give them opportunity to compete.
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  We are really our conference is really generous and cross
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  country we can have unlimited entries.
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  So every. Oh wow, yeah.
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  In a championship, we have really high event limits in
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  indoor and outdoor tracks, so every kid almost gets an
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  opportunity and that's that's something that every kid can
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  hang. On to that, yeah, is a.
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  Dream being as a hook, to stay involved, to stay engaged.
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  Right and. We can develop them into.
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  Stay in school, stay in school, keep earning your degree.
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  Yeah. So if you're on the.
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  Soccer team Only 11 people get on the field.
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  Yeah, yeah, possibility. Get on the field so there's
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  there's not as many opportunities and those coaches
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  are going to be forced to keep athletes happy, keep some
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  harmony on the team. And I think that's going to be a
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  greater challenge than people making decisions feel like it
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  is. Even if you can mandate it all
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  you want, in my opinion it's not that easy to keep a lot of
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  people happy in those sports. Yeah.
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  You know, there's times where we have some discourse and we have
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  to handle it, but we can provide opportunities and.
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  That's the. Difference for.
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  Our school, I love when you talked about, you know, 11
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  people on the field versus our sport.
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  That is, to me, the greatest part about our sport is the
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  inclusivity. So tall, short, big, small,
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  black, white, brown, not only for our athletes but also for
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  our coaches. And that, to me, that's what
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  makes it special and why we have to fight for it and make it
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  survive and thrive in what we're doing.
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  No, no, you're. Yeah.
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  I mean, I was. Going to say, I mean, I'm, I'm a
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  little bit, I mean, we understand the reality of what
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  we're facing in the future. But you know, I'm sad because as
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  a, as a coach also it goes against me.
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  This I like to give. Yeah, I.
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  Think maybe have potential and that's going to change.
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  Moving forward here. We're going to have to make
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  some. Decisions in our.
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  Process well Bob, so this will be published again next year as
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  we're leading into the 2025 convention.
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  So we're going to be able to check the answer to this next
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  question. What's your best prediction of
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  something that's going to happen in track and field?
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  And you know I'll I'll let you go ahead and cross country if
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  you'd like. I don't I don't know how I check
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  in cross country. I know nothing barely can spell
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  the words cross country. It could be very specific to
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  your program, could be elite level high school incident
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  blade. You get to take it.
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  What's a prediction you think's going to happen in this upcoming
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  track and field season? You know, you get to be as
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  specific as you like, you know? Yeah, yeah.
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  I mean, put you on the spot a little bit, I mean.
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  I think one of the things is I think there with all the
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  changes, number one, I think track field is is at the highest
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  level it's. Ever been?
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  It's amazing. It's amazing.
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  It's your fault, by the way, all your coaches.
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  It's all your fault. The.
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  Coaches do a great job and I think that's a hard question.
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  I just think it's going to be really different and they're,
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  you know, coaches are going to have to learn to adapt and
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  change and be able to be competitive at the level that
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  they're at and in the league they're in and and what the
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  expectations of the. Department, so it's not really.
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  A great. Answer all the coaches that I
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  know and I know a few adaptability is their middle
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  name. We we don't get in our sport and
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  not learn how to be adaptable. So I think if that's, if that's
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  truly what it's going to take to move and like survive and thrive
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  in our sport, man, we're in good hands.
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  I'm I'm good with that Bob. Thank you so much, man.
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  I'm grateful for you joining us, man.
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  Thank you so much. Absolutely.
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  We had someone all in the game mentioned about thanks for the
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  mic. I appreciate that.
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  The interesting as the addition of M JS GST golden spike.
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  No, what? What's Michael Johnson's Grand
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  Slam track? Oh my gosh, Golden Spikes I
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  think was an old professional track series way back in the day
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  in all in the game. Also asked will incidentally
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  athletes be allowed to go to World Relays?
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  That's a great question. Someone else mentioned earlier
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  about the calendar for the trials for the world champs.
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  That's going to be, that's going to be an issue.