Attention Coaches: Important Indoor track Information
Coaches, welcome to the 2024-25 MSTCA Indoor Track & Field Season. Each year, based on feedback from our Executive Committee (who, in-turn represent you) we make changes and adjustments to our offerings. Below you will find a “Highlights Summary” and after that a more thorough, meet-by-meet breakdown that we hope will be especially useful for new coaches, but is bound to have information any coach would find useful.
Highlights Summary:
LONG JUMP: The long-awaited elevated long jump runway is now at Reggie. After a week of work on it, while not finished as of this writing, I am feeling confident it will be ready to go this year. Meet by meet different groups will use the elevated versus the traditional runway. See meet formats for details. The single biggest change will be 3 jumps at Relays per athlete.
Because of the proximity to the hurdles and dash start line, my current expectation is to not start use of the elevated runway until after those two events have concluded when practicable. This information will be relayed in the pre-meet emails that come each week.
Additionally this new runway will necessitate moving the coaches boxes–I am still working on the best solution/locations for that.
MEDALS: We will be moving to 8 medal places in all of our medaled meets. In the past we had a mix of 6 and 8 places medaling in meets. We are standardizing at 8 places medaling in any meet where we offer medals. Additionally, at the Kalperis Relays we will score 8 places as well, on the standard 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 formula.
MEDAL STAND:Through a partnership with the students at Keefe Tech in Framingham we hope to unveil a new, high quality, 8-place medal stand that should fit all 4 athletes on medal-winning relay teams. Additionally, we expect to move the medal stand to the area outside turn one (where apparel sales have been in the past) which we hope will facilitate a better opportunity for picture taking.
EQUIPMENT:In addition to the new long jump runway, we are in the process of purchasing 50 new high-quality easy-adjustment hurdles for the Reggie. The MSTCA and the Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center have entered into an equipment purchasing agreement that we expect to result in a significant upgrade to the facility equipment over a period of a few years.
ENTRY STANDARDS:We have two meets that are individual “championships” of sorts–the Freshman-Sophomore Championship and the Coaches Invitational. We have made two fairly significant changes to the qualifying requirements for these meets.
For many events within these two meets we limited entries per team regardless of how many qualifiers the team had. This was done in an attempt to control the number of entries, but we felt unfairly punished good athletes on deep teams. Those caps have been removed. Qualify five athletes in an event, feel free to enter them all. Consequently, we adjusted many of the standards (some were actually made easier, but certainly more were made harder) and we are enforcing a hard standard (these are championship meets). Results must be from a verified meet posted on athletic.net or a meet where you provide all of the required supporting documentation in the entry. Incomplete or unverifiable entry marks will be rejected.
ENTRY LIMITS:All of our meets have event entry limits, but they differ meet to meet. Unfortunately, athletic.net only allows you to limit total events entered, not type of events. For example, when we have a 2-1 entry limit (2 running/1fied or 2 field/1 running) a.net will only allow a limiter of 3 total events.
If athletes are entered in more events than allowed by meet format, we will automatically scratch the athlete from the overage by event order. Our processes make it impractical to rely on meet-day scratches by coaches. These limits are “entry limits” not “competition limits.”
REGGIE CHANGES:The new leadership team at Roxbury Community College and the Reggie Lewis Center are working exceptionally hard at improving and upgrading the facility. There is one major change and one major request of note.
The change is that food will now be allowed inside the field house. It is hoped that this will improve concession sales and provide added revenue for facility improvements. PLEASE clean up your area after meets. If cleaning crew costs increase dramatically, the food experiment will likely end.
The request is also related to clean-up–specifically in regard to hip numbers. The Reggie staff spends hours after each meet scraping hip numbers off surfaces. We are NOT concerned with the hip numbers that fall off athletes in the course of competition–though your help with those is also appreciated. The focus is on hip numbers that are found stuck to bleachers, walls, toilets, etc throughout the building. Please talk to your athletes about this.
Meet by Meet Summaries: We try to offer a broad array of meets to meet the different needs of different caliber athletes. On the meet formats, you can find a brief description of “who the meet is geared towards” under “Meet Description.”
Some of our meets have no standards; some have “soft standards,” where we ask you to use your best judgement in not entering an athlete who is not likely to hit the mark; some have “hard standards,” where an athlete MUST have hit the mark in a verifiable meet where results are available for online viewing. None of our “hard standards” meets happen until late December and into January, giving you an opportunity to come to our other meets to hit the standards if you are in a league that does not contest dual meets regularly under FAT systems.
All meet information can be found under the “Calendar/Results” link on our website www.mstca.org.
Winter Festival: Events Offered: All traditional events offered.
Standards: Soft standards for the one mile and two mile.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 1 running; 1 field; 1 relay.
Notes: Two long jump offerings - competition (enter on a.net) and open practice runway (sign-up for free on site for 30-minute group access).
Speed Classic: Events Offered: 600m and down; LJ and Weight Throw.
Standards: No standards in any event.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 2 running events (incl relays) and 1 field event.
Notes: New this year, the meet is NOT divided by big and small schools. Entries are open to all for with or both days with an entry cap (first come first served on each event). Rules of the weight have changed regarding the handle. The only legal handle for use is 16cm.
Distance Classic and Pentathlon: Events Offered: 800m and up, including DMR; Shot Put and a limited Pentathlon field
Standards: Soft standards for all events, please don’t enter athletes who are not going to make the mark. FIRST 16 entries received in the Pentathlon for each gender.
Limits: Athletes (other than Pentathletes) may be entered in a maximum of 2 running events (incl relays) and 1 field event.
Boston Holiday Challenge at the TRACK at New Balance: Events Offered: Full range of events including spring distances, indoor distances; the usual field events, as well as Weight Throw, Triple Jump, and Pole Vault.
Standards: Hard standards on all events that must be verifiable through athletic.net.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 4 events.
Notes:The New Balance Championship Mile and 400-meters will be contested under USATF sanctioning and rules, by invitation only. Composite times for Relays are allowed.
Freshman-Sophomore Championships: Events Offered: All traditional events offered.
Standards:Hard standards on all events that must be verifiable through athletic.net.
Limits:Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 1 running; 1 field; 1 relay.
Notes:The two athletes per team per event cap has been removed. No 7th or 8th graders allowed. This is for 9th and 10th grade athletes only. Composite times for Relays are allowed.
Northeast Invitational: Events Offered: Full range of events including spring distances, indoor distances; the usual field events, as well as Weight Throw and Triple Jump.
Standards: No Standards, but entry caps with top verified performances for Triple Jump, Weight Throw and 4x800-meter Relay.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 4 events across the three days.
Notes: Friday is primarily distance events and non-traditional field events; Saturday is hurdles, Girls shot and long, indoor distances, and relays;Sunday is dash, Boys shot and long, spring distances.
Kalperis Relays: Events Offered:4-athlete running relay and 3-athlete field event relays.
Standards:None, except for B relays in field events, 4x800, and DMR.
Limits: Athletes may compete in up to three events in any combination.
Notes: Medals and scoring 8 places. 3 jumps/athlete in LJ. Field events relays entries must include 3 athletes/event entered as individuals. Running events must include anywhere between 1-4 athlete names) in the entry.
Coaches Invitational: Events Offered:All traditional events offered plus the Triple Jump.
Standards: Hard standards on all events that must be verifiable through athletic.net.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 3 events in any combination.
Notes: Event caps/team have been removed. TJ accepting top 12 entries only.
Qualifier Meet: Events Offered: All traditional events offered. “Nationals” relay events potentially offered Upon request to meet director.
Standards: “Soft standards” Please do not enter athletes who you don’t think can hit the standard. This is NOT a last chance for every athlete to compete.
Limits: Athletes may be entered in a maximum of 2 running events (including relays) and 1 field; or 2 field events and 1 running.
Notes:Standards for this meet are rough as a D1 close-to-qualifying athlete has a very different performance than a D5 close-to-qualifying athlete. Use your discretion, but be reasonable. This meet is not for all athletes.
Rising Championship: Events Offered:All of the MIAA Divisional Meet events, except the 4x800.
Standards: Top 20 (Relays), 30 (field events and 2 mile), 40 (all other events) entries from the 2024-25 Indoor T&F season only with verified marks on athletic.net.
Limits: An athlete may compete in a maximum of 3 events in any combination.
Notes: Any athlete who MIGHT compete in the MIAA Meets is ineligible for this meet. Once they compete in this meet they are forbidden to compete in the MIAA meets in ANY capacity (for example, even as a relay alternate).
Pentathlon: Events Offered:Pentathlon (55m Hurdles, SP, LJ, HJ, 1000m (men)/800m (women).
Standards: None
Limits: Up to 3 athletes per team may be entered.
Notes: Athletes compete individually and, where applicable, as members of a 3-athlete team.