Today's 800 was pretty impressive on a few fronts.
Until Abubaker Kaki's 1:42.69 this year at Bislett, there had been zero sub 1:43 clockings in the world since 2003 when Wilfred Bungei and Mbulaeni Mulaudzi went sub 1:43 in Brussels.
So 2 sub 1:43s in the one race is pretty impressive. The rabbit was great, as he went 49.5 just like the meet organizers wanted and stayed in it until 600m in 1:16. And the field didn't hang way back but stayed pretty close. That's what set things up for the 1:42s.
Yusuf Kamel (formerly Gregory Konchellah) may have lost the race by thousandths of a second to Yuriy Borzakovskiy (who's obviously in his best form since he won the gold in Athens), but his 1:42.79 finally did get him the family record at 800m.
His father, Billy Konchellah (2 time World 800m champ in 1987 and 1991), ran 1:43.06. But believe it or not, that was not the family record. Billy's younger brother Patrick, a Commonwealth Games gold medallist, ran 1:42.98 in 1997.
The family clearly has good 800m genes. But Kamel had better not rest on his laurels because his cousin Felix Konchellah (Patrick's son) could in a few years challenge the family record. Patrick has run 1:49.0, represented Kenya at the World Junior Champs, and is only 17.
Not to be overlooked at Monaco should be Gary Reed's 1:43.68 Canadian National Record in 4th. Reed was beaten by nearly a full second but has shown he can run rounds well as he got the silver at Worlds last year.