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From what I know, the AD has told people within the track program that Coach Straubel will be the coach for as long as he wants. He will never be fired, as bad as the track side wants him gone. His athletes don't do anything for the track side, and I believe on the guys side they brought in 0 points for the conference outdoor meet. He has no motivation and does very minimal recruiting as you everyone has already mentioned. It terms of recruiting, it is always difficult and will be interesting to see how they do this year with the coaching change. Yes the program could be successful, but I think it starts at the top with the AD wanting to put forth the effort to have the program be successful. As far as I know, the AD doesn't care how the cc/track does as long as they are providing an experience for the student-athlete. He couldn't care less if they contend for a conference championship or not.

It seems like things may have gotten tougher in trying to improve the running events. I spoke with one of the athletes today, sounds like the sprints coach isn't returning for next year. She told me that the sprints coach is always a GA and basically rotates every two years. How do you expect to improve when you have a new coach every 2 years, if not sooner? I doubt a brand new track will fix that.

It sounds like the most frustration is coming from the distance/cross country side of the program. Keep in mind, that VU treats Cross Country and Track as two separate sports. The head cross country coach is also the distance coach, and he basically recruits his own way instead of how the track program does. They don't share offices, they don't share monies, and it seems like they don't do anything together. So the distance/cross country kids are recruited by the head cross country coach, but the head track and field coach has no power of who he recruits.

As a former runner and Valpo Alumni, I understand the thought process on why people think Valpo should recruit more local kids. However it was already said earlier, they don't want to stay in Valpo. Why bother wasting the time and resources when 99% of the local kids want to leave Valparaiso and attend a different school? The local kids that want to attend Valpo are on the team, and doing well, but for the most part the local kids want to get the heck out of town. The program can't entice the top talent in the area to stay because they basically have 0 scholarships, and the smart & fast kids are going to attend the schools like Notre Dame and IU.