Just out of curiosity, do having times in track as good as whatever college you’re applying to hold any leeway in admssions/ improve your chance of admission? For example, Swarthmore’s fastest 800m time was 2:02, if an applicant runs a 2:00, will that help his app? Assuming his stats are only minutely subpar compared to the status quo, for example, idk, a 3.7 instead of a 3.9. I ask this because for selective schools, I have a feeling that most of their teams are filled with walk ons, but then again, I could be wrong.
For it to be a hook, you will need the coach’s support. Times alone won’t make a difference. You could be ridiculously fast and have no interest in running in college.
If you want to run in college and can be a contributor to a team, contact the coach. Many teams take walk ons, but some do not, so you should also understand the lay of the land.
It sounds like this could definitely be a hook for you but you will have to reach out to make it happen. You don’t know who else the coach may be talking to.
D3 coaches generally don’t commit to support a recruit until late summer early fall, so there still is time to contact the coach(s) of schools you wish to pursue. You will need to send verified times from actual competitions to the coach(s). Also remember coaches’ slots are limited. The T&F coach will not have a slot for each event. Some coaches at some schools are allowed to support additional athletes above their slot quota which might serve to enhance that particular EC, but in those cases the AO is unlikely to admit a student who is otherwise not academically competitive. Without a coach’s support, athletics is just an EC.
There are plenty of walk-ons in D3 athletics because there are plenty of good but not recruitable athletes in the student body who want to participate. Those students all got in because of the quality of their overall application, not becasue they were skilled in a specific area of athletics.
As others have said, contact the coaches. However, keep in mind that coaches will use their support for athletes that they think can score at the conference meet. I think it’s unlikely a 2 flat will get much interest but you can check. Swarthmore, for example, had 5 sub-2 guys this year, none of them scored at the conference meet.
You don’t actually say in your post that you are interested in running in college. Are you? If you are not interested in running in college but are wondering if you would get an admissions bump from a high school time, the answer is no. Admissions couldn’t care less how fast you run unless the coach wants you.
As others have said, if you want to run in college, contact the coach. Otherwise you time means nothing to admissions. Regarding walk-ons, your assumption is incorrect. Many of the top D3 schools do not take walk-ons (or if they do, they train only and won’t compete anywhere beyond a local home meet).
Again, you would need to contact the individual coaches to get the answer to that. 2:00 flat wouldn’t cut it at many D3 schools.
The swarthmore team needs to have a slot or need that you would potentially fill. Just running times their runners already do brings nothing added to the team. It is up to the coach, If he has 5 guys who already ran sub 2:00 and didn’t score points at conference you aren’t in a good position to be a supported or recruited athlete there.