We are in the middle of another great cross-country season. As it progresses toward the championship part of the journey, all those involved should be thinking of ways to both improve and protect the sport. In this month's article, I will focus on topics that need to be addressed in order to insure that the sport and its participants have a bright and prosperous future.

Several issues have come to my attention this fall that should concern fans, coaches, parents, and runners:

-The OHSAA did not finalize regional assignments until the second week of the competitive season. At the time this article is being written, teams in the Northwest, Central, and Southwest Districts still do not know where they will be going for their regional championships. This causes many problems for all of those involved. For example, many coaches plan their competitive and practice schedules based on the location of the regional meet. This is done in order to run against potential regional opponents, train for certain terrain, and familiarize their runners with the course. In addition to technical problems, it is simply disrespectful to be treated in this manner. No other OSHAA sport has encountered this situation.

-The Associated Press will no longer publish state polls in any sport except football and basketball. This will further hurt visibility for cross-country. It is a fact that many readers around the state follow these polls, and they are used as a motivator for coaches. Most importantly, it is another way that our sport is promoted. It will now become necessary for coaches to refer to the OATCCC website and pass along the poll information to their respective newspapers. The coaches' association should make certain that this happens. A call to the local sports editor will be helpful.

-The newest trend among high school teams is to eliminate dual meets. As this trend has developed, many teams do not host ANY home meets. This hurts our sport. No other sport at any high school fails to host home contests, with the possible exception of golf. Athletes, parents, and fans want to see their teams in action without traveling a long distance, and, with current gasoline prices, this is especially true. In addition to the expense and travel time, in especially large meets it is sometimes hard to even see individuals because of the number of participants or the design of the course. We recently hosted a dual meet on a Tuesday, after school, with a local rival. We had a large crowd and heard many positive comments from fans, administrators, and parents. Our parking lot was full, and we had everyone home in time for dinner. The race distance was two miles, and both teams practiced after the race. It was the equivalent of a hard practice, and it allowed our team to run at home.

-At times, newspaper coverage of our great sport gets neglected on the sports pages. This season, a large newspaper in NE Ohio did not publish a preview of area cross-country teams, despite doing previews of all other fall sports. After a call to the sports editor bringing this to his attention, a very good, thorough preview was done. The lesson learned was - if those in charge of making decisions regarding what is reported don't hear from the readers, they think no one cares. Three calls and three faxes were required to get another paper to publish the results of the previously mentioned dual meet. It took perseverance, but the mission was eventually accomplished, and the athletes who ran received their due recognition.

-Meet directors are relying on newspapers to refer to Baums Page for meet results. This isn't working. Results should be faxed to the sports dept. immediately after the meet, with a follow-up phone call to make certain they are received and understood.

The purpose of this month's article is not to focus on the negative, but to bring issues that can hurt our sport to the readers' attention, with the hope that corrections and improvements will occur. If the passionate cross-country community is informed about the actual or potential problems, then there is hope for positive change. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of insanity, according to Albert Einstein. If we don't act on problems presented in this article, we shouldn't expect them to change.

In closing and on a more positive note, all those that follow our sport should subscribe to the High School Cross-Country Report. Editor and publisher, Marc Bloom, does an outstanding job of presenting news and ideas about cross-country, in addition to rankings, runners' profiles, meet results, and many more interesting bits of information. Mr. Bloom may be the best ambassador for our sport, thanks to his passionate approach.

Another positive idea that is being implemented in invitational meets is the inclusion of races for elementary-age children. It is a great way to introduce cross-country to the young participants. Look at other sports like soccer, and see how they build interest with this age group. (This topic will be addressed in an upcoming issue.)

Let's all work together to make cross-country a better sport and prove a quote that I recently saw on the back of a t- shirt: "Cross-country - a sport that is too good for this world."

Good luck this fall, and keep working to make high school cross- country even better.

Yours in track, Rod O'Donnell

To read coach O'Donnell's other articles about Saving Track and Field go to: http://www.runohio.com/archive/news/index.html

Editor's note: Rod O'Donnell has served as the head cross- country coach and track and field coach at both Caldwell and Hudson High Schools. He has also led teams from Kent State, Marshall University, and Rio Grande College. In 12 years of coaching high school cross-country, Rod has coached seven District Championship teams, and four Regional Champion teams. He has had eight State Meet appearances where his teams have placed 14th, 8th, 7th, 5th, 10th, 2,nd with two first place finishes. In addition, one of his runners, Wesley Smith was the 2002 State Champion and Footlocker runner-up. While at Hudson, Coach O'Donnell has had 17 State Meet qualifiers as well as the State Meet Champion in both the 3200 M. and 1600 M.

While at Kent State, he was named MAC Coach of the Year twice. Rod had 27 NCAA qualifiers in track and cross-country and 11 All-Americans. At Marshall, Rod was also named Coach of the Year twice in the Southern Conference. His teams had 25 Conference Champions and three NCAA qualifiers. He started the women's cross-country program at Marshall, in addition to starting the cross-country program at Caldwell High School in 1971. In 1973, his team won the State Championship and had a dual record for three years of 38-0. Overall, Coach O'Donnell has a high school dual record in track of 71-21 and 81-6 in cross-country.

Rod is always willing to help others in the field, and he has written many articles and has spoken at many clinics, encouraging others to given back to the sport.

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Check with your local high school to see when and where their League Championships and Distract Championship are being held and enjoy the day watching a cross-country meet.

Friday, October 5th - All Ohio Collegiate Cross Country Championships will be hosted by Ohio Wesleyan University at the Methodist Theological School in Delaware starting at 2:00 p.m.

Saturday, November 3rd - Ohio High School Athletic Association State Championships, Scioto Downs, Columbus - races start at 11am - http://www.ohs aa.org/sports/cc/default.asp

Saturday, December 8th USATF National Club Championships at Voice of America Park in West Chester - http://www.usatf.org/events/2007/USATFClubXCChampionships and http://www.columbusrunning .com