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The Stats of XCStats
The heart of XCStats is of course, the stats! And a lot of them
there are! So much so that you may find them a bit daunting on your first
visit. But don’t despair; you’ll quickly become an expert at understanding
the data and the layout of the site.
XCStats includes 14 reports and 6 charts that are packed full of information. Below
are descriptions and explainations of those reports. You’ll find that most
of the information in the reports and charts to be familiar, so this description will
focus on the less obvious. Illustrations are included below or you can
go to a “live” example from the Archbishop Mitty High School data by clicking
on the report title.
The layout of a team’s "XCStats By Season" Page
A team’s XCStats home page is their "XCStats By Season" page
which is accessible from the Subscribing Schools navigation selection.
This page is laid out with the All-Time and Summary reports
shown on the left side navigation column and the reports from each event, for
every season, shown in the main section. An example is shown to the right.
The team XCStats By Season page gives you immediate access to all events for
every season and to the All-Time reports. You might want to bookmark this
page for easy access.
Example Report
Probably the most visited report, this shows the results and stats for each
runner who participated in that particular race. An example is shown below. The less obvious columns are:
- Squad – This is the division in which the runner participated in
for this race, usually V (Varsity), JV (Junior Varsity), So (Sophomore)
or Fr (Freshman). Many races have different divisions and runners frequently
compete in different divisions during the season.
- Pace – this is mile pace, even if the race distance is in meters.
- Dist – distance in miles.
- Place – the place of finish of each runner and the size of the field
who competed in this race.
- Rank in Squad – where the runner ranked within his own school and squad.
- Rank in School – where the runner ranked within all those runners from
his/her school who ran the same distance.
- Rank vs Comp – This is short for rank vs competition. This gives the
ranking of a runner as compared to runners from other schools who finished at
the same rank in their squad. In the example above, Greg finished 5th
in his squad. When compared to the 5th place runners from the 18 other
schools who had at least 5 runners, Greg finished 8th. This is a fun way to
see how one compares to their “peers” at other schools. A note on statistics:
this measurement is less valid as the relative sizes of the squads are different.
- Last Year Time – the time a runner achieved when running the
same course and distance a year ago. A "year ago" is defined as being plus or
minus 11 days from a year ago.
- Last Race Time - the time a runner had on their previous running of
this course and distance
- Last PR - a runner's personal record prior to this race.
- Imprvmnts - Whether the runner achieved an "Improvement". An Improvement is
defined as any of the following (based on the same course and distance): improving on their time from a year ago (LY), improving on
their time the last time they ran the course (LR) or setting a new PR (PR).
Each runner is also hyperlinked to their career report, which is discussed below.
Example Report
If you’re familiar with high school Cross Country, then you’re aware that the
place of finish of the first 5 runners determines the official team results.
In XCStats, this same concept is applied for every group of 5 runners, spreading
the fun of team competition to almost every runner. An example is shown below.
In this case, notice that the JV squad sent at least 10 runners into the race
since there is a team entry for "JV 1st 5" and "JV 2nd 5". The first group of 5 finished
1st out of 7 teams with 28 points. The
runners making up that team are shown in the right column, along with their
point score. The 2nd group of 5 is made up of those runners who finished
6th through 10th on their squad and they are compared to like runners from
other schools. The 2nd group of JV runners finished 1st out of 5 teams with
17 points. Both JV teams set new PR’s (and LY's and LR's). Team
Improvements are based on the
squad name (i.e. "JV 1st 5"). For example, the JV 2nd 5 gets a new PR when they beat
the time of the best time of any previous JV 2nd 5 team. The Time and Points
fields for the first 5 runners in each race should correspond to the “official”
results of the event. Here is a description of the non-obvious columns from
the team report:
-
Rank of finish – where the team finished compared to the number of
teams in the race.
- Avg pace – the average mile pace for the 5 runners that make up this team.
- 1st & 5th place pace – the mile pace for the 1st and 5th runners on
this team.
- Points – This is the team point total. Team points are the sum of
the place of finish of each runner on the team with the exception that runners
from teams that are not in the team competition (i.e. less than 5 runners)
and runners from teams who have more than 7 runners are not assigned a point
value. This is why a runner’s point value is often less than their place of
finish. For the “extra” teams in each group (those beyond the first 5), their
point totals are done the same way, relative to their team positions. For
example, the third group of 5 will be assigned team point values as if the
first 10 runners from all other schools were not in the race.
- Win Team pace – the average pace of the winning team of that group.
- Last Year Time, Last Race Time, Last PR – These are described above
in the discussion of the individual race results report. All "Improvements"
apply to teams just as individuals.
- Improvements - an indication of the Improvement accomplished by the team
either LY, LR, PR or some combination.
- Runners – The list of runners who made up this team along with their
team point numbers.
Example Report
This page has two elements. First, the Improvement Accomplishment Chart shows the number of
Improvements that were achieved compared to the number of possible Improvements for each race. (It can only be
an "Improvement" after the first time a runner has run the course.) The chart also shows the
cumulative PR Achievement percentage for a given season. For teams that have chosen
to set and display an Improvement Achievement percentage goal, that goal will also be
shown on this chart.
The second part of this report is the Season Summary Report. This report has it all!
It shows every race by every runner during the season, an indication of the
type of Improvement that was achieved in that race and a series of summary
statistics. An example is shown below. The data, by column:
-
Race Results for each runner - there is one column for every race this season.
Shown for each runner is their time, pace and rank of finish within their
school for all those runners who have run the same distance. You will notice
text formatting in each cell. A bold format indicates a new PR. Italics
means that the runner has not run that course and distance before and underlined
text means that they accomplished either an LY or an LR, or both.
Summary columns - These include:
-
# - the number of races by this runner.
- Avg Pace - the average mile pace.
- Adj Rank - this is the ranking of every runner on the team if one
"sorted" them based on their average rank of finish within a race, described next.
- Adj Avg Fin – this is the computed average of the place of finish within the school. For example,
if a runner finished 5th on one race and 10th on another, within the school, his/her Adj Avg Fin
would be 7.5.
- Imp - the number of Improvements compared to the number of chances for Improvement.
- PRs - the number of PR's for the season. One can calculate the number of LY and LR improvements
either by counting the cells with underlined text or by taking total Improvements (given by "Imp")
and subtracting the number of PRs.
Example Report
This report shows the All-Time race times for a given course, both team
and individual. It appears as one link on the team home page, but this
is really two reports with many, many options. After you run the report for a given course,
you will see a selection form similar as the one shown. Your form may look
different as only choices appear if options exist. For example, you won’t
be given a choice for "Gender" if the report is from all boys school, nor will
you get one for "Distance" if only one distance has been run at that course. Select whether you
want to see individual or team PR's, "Current" or "Current and Grads" (i.e. past and
current runners) and gender and distance, if shown. The grade filter lets you
look at only those races that were run when the runner was in the selected year
in high school. You can spend a lot of time
exploring the options in this report! The data in the report is straightforward.
Example Report
This report lists all runners based on their average pace
throughout high school. As with the Course PR report, you can select
Current or All Runners and Gender. And example of the report is shown.
The fields in the report are straightforward.
Example Report
Here’s one that you can really study! This report collects and displays
year-by-year summaries of measures such as team size, class and school average speed and Improvement
achievement. The top section contains two charts. The left side shows the
total Improvement achievement percentage for the entire team for each season. The right side chart displays the team
size from year to year. An example is shown above.
The lower section of this report shows tables that contain average pace and Improvement
achievement for each class, for Varsity and the whole school throughout
history! It’s a good way to see the long term trends for
the team. It also is a good way to promote some fun competition between
classes or between the boys and girls teams. The Improvement Accomplishment table (the lower one)
provides more detail than the chart, showing the results by class.
Example Report
This chart and report captures the entire career of every cross country runner! Create
a link to it from your MySpace or Facebook account so all your buddies can see what you've done!
On top, is an chart showing every race of the runners' career and all of their
new Personal Records.
Below the chart are 3 different tables. They are:
- Personal Records for every course and distance. Click on a course name
to see a chart of all the races by this runner on that course.
- Career Averages by Season - including average pace, Improvement accomplishments and team rank.
- Full running history - every race, including every Improvement, throughout a runner's high school career
This report is reachable from any report in
which the specific runner appears - just click on their name.
All School Reports
In addition to the individual school reports, there are three reports that
pull data from all the subscriber schools. These reports highlight the
achievement of new personal records and those runners who have run for
all four years in high school. These reports are accessible via the
navigation bar at the top of every XCStats page.
Example Report
This report is a ranking of the subscriber schools based on percent
achievement of new personal records. All runners, boys and girls, are
combined together.
Example Report
This report is a listing of those runners who have achieved a new personal
record within two weeks of the last recorded event.
Example Report
Those dedicated Seniors, who have run Cross Country are celebrated here.
Their names appear all season long in this report. Congratulations to
those runners who have been so dedicated to cross country!
Coach-only Reports
XCStats provides reports specifically for coaches to help the team
prepare for upcoming meets. Only one of the reports is shown here, as
others are are "top secret".
Team Handout Report
This report shows all the races that each runner on the current team
has run at a given course. It is very useful to help team member set appropriate
goals for upcoming meets.