A frequent Missouri MileSplit poster recently tried to prove the idea that getting your fifth man ahead of everyone else's fifth man is the best predictor of winning the meet. He sifted through state meet results back to 1948 (128 races), and found that it was not the fifth man that was the best indicator, but who had the best fourth man. We have been working hard this week on adding meet results to the website and getting them in the database, but wanted to take a break to see how this broke down for Kansas. We do not have results back until 1948, but we do until 2003. We went through 5A and 6A for a total of 36 races. The percentage of state champions from the past nine years having the best one-man, two-man and so forth is:
One Runner: 33%
Two Runer: 47%
Three Runner: 64%
Four Runner: 69%
Five Runner: 86%
Six Runner: 69%
Seven Runner: 50%
There was a very interesting divide between guys and girl, though. Here the percentages are based off of gender:
Boys:
One Runner: 44%
Two Runner: 61%
Three Runner: 78%
Four Runner: 94%
Five Runner: 83%
Six Runner: 72%
Seven Runner: 50%
Girls:
One Runner: 22%
Two Runner: 33%
Three Runner: 50%
Four Runner: 44%
Five Runner: 88%
Six Runner: 66%
Seven Runner: 50%
As you can see, for boys, having the best four runner at the state meet has almost always lead to a state title for 5A and 6A boys (17 out of 18, and 9/9 for 6A Boys). Having the top four, five, and six also were very indicative of state titles. For the girls, it was the five that is the main indication (16 out of 18), followed by having the best six. Both guys and girls proved the idea that all seven runners count as having the best seventh runner led to a state title half of the time.
While we were at it, we looked how many top runners of each number runner it took. For boys, it averaged out to 4.8, girls 3.4, for an average of 4.1 for the both boys and girls combined. An interesting notes; only one team has not had anyone as the best runner of their number on the team, and only one has had every runner be the best runner of their number in all 36 races we looked at. The only 1-7 sweep was Shawnee Mission Northwest in the 6A Boys Race in 2005 were they went 1, 2, 5, 10, 29, 33 and 43. The only team to win with no top runner for their number on the team was St. Thomas Aquinas in the 2004 6A Girls Race were they went 14, 20, 28, 38, 39, 60 and 76.