ABOUT EL TORO CROSS COUNTRY
Order of Events, Home Course, How to Score Cross Country

Order of Events in the South Coast League

All league meets (with the exception to the League Finals in November) will follow the following order.  No exceptions will be made.

3:00 pm - Junior Varsity Boys
3:05 pm - Junior Varsity Girls
3:35 pm - Freshmen Boys
3:40 pm - Frosh/Soph Girls
4:10 pm - Sophomore Boys
4:35 pm - Varsity Girls
5:00 pm - Varsity Boys 

Note that these times are tentative and are subject to change.  For the JV and F/S girls races, there may be up to a five minute discrepancy.

Our Home Course

El Toro's home course is O'Neill Regional Park, located 10 miles from El Toro High School.

Directions: take El Toro Road out towards Portola Hills.  Continue until you reach Cook's Corner, and turn right (the name of the road is Live Oak).  You will follow the road until you see the turn-off for O'Neill park on your right (you might smell the horses first!).  Parking is $2, and is located to the right after passing through the entry-gate.  The course starts at close to the parking lot - follow the various athletes to the finish line (at the end of the road - you will see a large grassy area with a flagged chute).

How Cross Country is Scored

Similar to the game of golf, the team with the lowest number of points wins.  Each time will base its score off of its top five finishing runners (any team with less than 5 competing athletes per race automatically forfeits).  For example, if El Toro were to place its top five finishers in positions 1, 4, 5, 6 and 10, and Trabuco Hills were to place its top five finishers in positions 2, 3, 7, 8 and 9, the scores would work out as follows:

Because El Toro scored 26 points to Trabuco Hills' 29 points, El Toro would be deemed the winner of the race.

Any team that places its top three finishers in the positions 1, 2, 3 automatically wins, because it is mathematically impossible for an opposing team to get a lower score.

A team's 6th and 7th place finishers also play a role in a team's scoring.  Only these two runners may displace the opposing team's scoring runners, thereby increasing the opposing team's total score.  Any team's athlete finishing beyond the 8th position may not affect the scoring of the race.  For example, if El Toro were to place finishers 2, 3, 6, 8, 9, with 6th and 7th place finishers being in spots 10 and 11, and Capo Valley were to place finishers 1, 4, 5, 7 and 12 (because of El Toro's displacement), the overall scores would be

Because of El Toro's 28 points to Capo Valley's 29, El Toro wins (notice some bias?).

Any race that results with a score of 15 to 50 is referred to as a perfect score.  This means that the winning team places its runners in places 1 to 7, and the losing team took the places 8 to 12.

Winning Combinations for Dual Meet Competition

The following scores all lead to possible scores of 27.

1 - 2 - 5 - 9 - 10
1 - 2 - 6 - 8 - 10
1 - 2 - 7 - 8 - 9
1 - 3 - 4- 9 - 10
1 - 3 - 5 - 8 - 10
1 - 4 - 5 - 8 - 9
1 - 4 - 6 - 7 - 9
1 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8

2 - 4 - 5 - 7 - 8
2 - 3 - 4 - 8 - 10
2 - 3 - 5 - 8 - 9
2 - 3 - 6 - 7 - 9
2 - 3 - 5 - 7 - 10
3 - 4 - 5 - 7 - 8
3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 9