Drew Windle = Robby Andrews 2.0

Bumping this after Windle's heat this morning in London. Maybe now somebody else will acknowledge the truth of this statement. He's going to be doing the same schtick for years even though it is an awful strategy.

Watched Monaco 800 wrote:

Bumping this after Windle's heat this morning in London. Maybe now somebody else will acknowledge the truth of this statement. He's going to be doing the same schtick for years even though it is an awful strategy.

Annnd he did it again, didn't even give himself a chance to make the final.

Robby ran 1:44.7 in college.

Drew ran 1:46.9 up till mid last year, his first year as a pro.

He might of not given himself a shot tactically but he ran 1:46.3 today after making the semi on an auto spot yesterday. How much more you would expect out of this young man this year? Maybe he was tired because it is August. All the US 800 guys looked spent today, our system can be difficult.

I was at New York when he won and ran 1:44.6, he was out in 50point, up near the front.

Watched Monaco 800 wrote:

Achieved one good result by sitting at the back of the field and kicking from way back in the last 150m. Will now spend the rest of his career employing this same strategy despite prolific evidence that it doesn't work against runners who aren't much slower than him.

You're a moron, seriously. If he went out harder he would just blow up and run worse. No amount of tactics will allow a 1:44 guy to beat a bunch of guys who have run 1:42. Not this year anyway.

Watched Monaco 800 wrote:

Bumping this after Windle's heat this morning in London. Maybe now somebody else will acknowledge the truth of this statement. He's going to be doing the same schtick for years even though it is an awful strategy.

You bumped it when his tactic actually got him to the semis?

And then 5th in the semis is not bad.

The other runners were better than him.

He wasn't going to get to finish higher by going out faster.

The 800 is a unique event.

Some are front runners and some run more evenly.

And Andrews just won a US title.

How is it an insult to compare a runner to him?

Star wrote:

And then 5th in the semis is not bad.

The other runners were better than him.

This.

If 4 years from now Windle has a 1:42 PR and he blows it in the heats/semis because he hung back too long, then you can reasonably raise your complaint. But today, he was simply a guy who got beat by better runners.

It's fair enough to say that the others were simply better today.

But his strategy is not what got him through in the heats. It almost kept him out, he was lucky people got out of his way.

And I have a suspicion that in the years to come, Windle will keep doing this same thing over and over. That is why I compare him to Robby. It's burned Robby many times and it may do the same to Windle. Look what happened the one time Robby didn't do this-he finally challenged Centro and won a US title.

The point stands that this is not a winning strategy for mid-distance running, and Drew Windle has come to rely on it.

Robby ran the same way he always does at US championships. Hung back while Centrowitz and Blankenship took off.

HardLoper wrote:

Robby ran the same way he always does at US championships. Hung back while Centrowitz and Blankenship took off.

Now, that is just not true. He was actually in the lead briefly with a lap to go, which was incredible to me. Usually he would be way back.

Watched Monaco 800 wrote:

HardLoper wrote:

Robby ran the same way he always does at US championships. Hung back while Centrowitz and Blankenship took off.

Now, that is just not true. He was actually in the lead briefly with a lap to go, which was incredible to me. Usually he would be way back.

It is completely true. He did not take the lead with a lap to go, not sure what you're remembering. He was in 5th place with a lap to go and a pretty sizeable gap to the top 2.

HardLoper wrote:

Watched Monaco 800 wrote:

Now, that is just not true. He was actually in the lead briefly with a lap to go, which was incredible to me. Usually he would be way back.

It is completely true. He did not take the lead with a lap to go, not sure what you're remembering. He was in 5th place with a lap to go and a pretty sizeable gap to the top 2.

You are right, it was with more than a lap to go. Still, he did have the lead at one point before the final 100, and it was a distinctly different type of race than he normally runs.

He led very early on while the pace was comfortable, not really relevant. When the real racing began he did what he does, hung back and relied on his kick in the last 200m. And there's nothing wrong with that, many have been successful at the 800 with those tactics.

It was very relevant. Only a few guys actually went past him, and he didn't have to work as hard to move up into position or go wide around the entire field. I'm hoping he'll stay closer to the front earlier here in London, too. I doubt it, though.

HardLoper wrote:

He led very early on while the pace was comfortable, not really relevant. When the real racing began he did what he does, hung back and relied on his kick in the last 200m. And there's nothing wrong with that, many have been successful at the 800 with those tactics.