Mike Smith has a proven track record of successfully coaching his college team and his post collegiates. I would argue that the NAU coaching job is less demanding than Oregon, to a degree. Fewer media appearances at NAU. Smith is already at altitude. His athletes don’t have to travel for an altitude camp multiple times a year, like BTC. Smith can supervise every workout. Jerry can’t travel to altitude. Smith’s pros will be at the same big meets as Bosley, Young and his other top college guys (except obviously NCAA stuff). The Oregon team often has a different racing schedule, including a few big home meets. There is more pressure for Jerry to interact with the UO fans.
Teg got 4th at Worlds and ran 3:34/8:07 while Jerry was still coaching Wisconsin with a lot less resources and support staff than he has now, but I take your point that the UO job is different than anywhere else
Jerry already hadn't been going to altitude camps with the team, so they're used to training without him there day-to-day. Sollnsky and Flanagan can hold down the fort in Eugene if Jerry wants to go to Park City for some big workouts
Also fwiw Schweitzer, Infeld, and Cranny all seem to be together in Flag right now, so maybe Kincaid is just there and looking for guys to go for runs with
Everyone in BTC is in Flag right now and training together minus Woody, he is pretty obviously gone. But yeah, the consternation about Jerry being distracted for workouts is ridiculous, since he is rarely there anyway and flys in a couple times for big workouts at altitude. Woody is over 30, he probably just didn’t want to move to Eugene.
I feel like he was too often a “team player” in Bowerman and had maybe a lower opinion of himself than he should’ve had.
Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow broek 13:00 under Jerry's training. He knows in his hear of heart's there is a WIDE divide between his talent level and Grant's. But he also knows if it comes down to a kick, he'll likely beat Grant.
He probably also knows if he does the same training as Grant he won't beat him as Grant is better so why not try something else. The problem is Jerry's training of Woddy is the best coaching job done by any coach in this country in the professional era.
And if you disagree with that last statement, please give me the example of a single college alsos-ran who developed like Woody did on the men's side.
I feel like he was too often a “team player” in Bowerman and had maybe a lower opinion of himself than he should’ve had.
Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow broek 13:00 under Jerry's training. He knows in his hear of heart's there is a WIDE divide between his talent level and Grant's. But he also knows if it comes down to a kick, he'll likely beat Grant.
He probably also knows if he does the same training as Grant he won't beat him as Grant is better so why not try something else. The problem is Jerry's training of Woddy is the best coaching job done by any coach in this country in the professional era.
And if you disagree with that last statement, please give me the example of a single college alsos-ran who developed like Woody did on the men's side.
You could say Grant is also a 13:30 guy who somehow broke 12:50 under Jerry’s training 🤷His college PRs weren’t that impressive either.
Grant’s college to pro progression is better than Woody’s btw : 3:39/7:42/13:29 to 3:35/7:28/12:46/26:33
Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow broek 13:00 under Jerry's training. He knows in his hear of heart's there is a WIDE divide between his talent level and Grant's. But he also knows if it comes down to a kick, he'll likely beat Grant.
He probably also knows if he does the same training as Grant he won't beat him as Grant is better so why not try something else. The problem is Jerry's training of Woddy is the best coaching job done by any coach in this country in the professional era.
And if you disagree with that last statement, please give me the example of a single college alsos-ran who developed like Woody did on the men's side.
I would never suggest Jerry didn't do an exceptional job with Woody. A few points of order, though.
1. Woody ran 13:27 (in the old spikes) in 2016 pre-Jerry. At that time that was a pretty good mark for a collegiate as was the achievement of 8th in the US Trials. 2. It's not particularly uncommon for athletes to improve their 5,000 times by 10-20 seconds from their last summer in the NCAA over their pro career. Fisher improved more as a poster chimed in. Let's see where Grijalva, Nur, Teare et al. net out. 3. Woody did have excellent improvement and I'd tend to agree with your point on the training. At this stage of his career, I'm not sure a workout that Grant can complete and Woody only gets 60% through is the ideal training for Woody. With Mike Smith, perhaps the workouts will be more individualized and build more confidence/fitness.
Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow broek 13:00 under Jerry's training. He knows in his hear of heart's there is a WIDE divide between his talent level and Grant's. But he also knows if it comes down to a kick, he'll likely beat Grant.
He probably also knows if he does the same training as Grant he won't beat him as Grant is better so why not try something else. The problem is Jerry's training of Woddy is the best coaching job done by any coach in this country in the professional era.
And if you disagree with that last statement, please give me the example of a single college alsos-ran who developed like Woody did on the men's side.
I would never suggest Jerry didn't do an exceptional job with Woody. A few points of order, though.
1. Woody ran 13:27 (in the old spikes) in 2016 pre-Jerry. At that time that was a pretty good mark for a collegiate as was the achievement of 8th in the US Trials. 2. It's not particularly uncommon for athletes to improve their 5,000 times by 10-20 seconds from their last summer in the NCAA over their pro career. Fisher improved more as a poster chimed in. Let's see where Grijalva, Nur, Teare et al. net out. 3. Woody did have excellent improvement and I'd tend to agree with your point on the training. At this stage of his career, I'm not sure a workout that Grant can complete and Woody only gets 60% through is the ideal training for Woody. With Mike Smith, perhaps the workouts will be more individualized and build more confidence/fitness.
I actually think Woody training with guys around his level (Bosley, Grijalva, Nico and Nur all around 13:00-13:10) will be better than grinding every workout trying to chase 12:46/26:33 guys. He’ll be training much more within himself, which seems to work well for Jakob and Kipchoge.
You could say Grant is also a 13:30 guy who somehow broke 12:50 under Jerry’s training 🤷His college PRs weren’t that impressive either.
Grant’s college to pro progression is better than Woody’s btw : 3:39/7:42/13:29 to 3:35/7:28/12:46/26:33
Woody: 3:43/7:48/13:32 to 3:37/7:38/12:58/27:12
Grant was a sub-4 guy in high school, and a national champ in college by his sophomore year. The talent level gap between the two is immense. Just looking at the PR's isn't telling you the whole story.
You could say Grant is also a 13:30 guy who somehow broke 12:50 under Jerry’s training 🤷His college PRs weren’t that impressive either.
Grant’s college to pro progression is better than Woody’s btw : 3:39/7:42/13:29 to 3:35/7:28/12:46/26:33
Woody: 3:43/7:48/13:32 to 3:37/7:38/12:58/27:12
Grant was a sub-4 guy in high school, and a national champ in college by his sophomore year. The talent level gap between the two is immense. Just looking at the PR's isn't telling you the whole story.
Maybe my comment wasn’t expressed correctly, but my point is that the idea that Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow ran sub 13 just due to jerry makes no sense and undermines his talent.
He and Grant (and even Mo, 13:28 in college) improved by a similar margin in the 5k after going pro. Yes Grant was more talented, as his 1500 and 3k (3:39 7:42 ) were better than Woodys so it makes sense than he’s faster now, but Kincaid wasn’t exactly an « also ran » in college.
I also think everyone is overrating how good Grant was in college because of how good he is now. He would consistently finish 2-4 at NCAAs, with one win, which is very good but didn’t indicate that he was going to run 12:46/26:33. Jerry deserves just as much credit for developing him as he does for developing woody
Woody is a 13:30 guy who somehow broek 13:00 under Jerry's training. He knows in his hear of heart's there is a WIDE divide between his talent level and Grant's. But he also knows if it comes down to a kick, he'll likely beat Grant.
He probably also knows if he does the same training as Grant he won't beat him as Grant is better so why not try something else. The problem is Jerry's training of Woddy is the best coaching job done by any coach in this country in the professional era.
And if you disagree with that last statement, please give me the example of a single college alsos-ran who developed like Woody did on the men's side.
You could say Grant is also a 13:30 guy who somehow broke 12:50 under Jerry’s training 🤷His college PRs weren’t that impressive either.
Grant’s college to pro progression is better than Woody’s btw : 3:39/7:42/13:29 to 3:35/7:28/12:46/26:33
Woody: 3:43/7:48/13:32 to 3:37/7:38/12:58/27:12
Grant arrived a 13:30 guy as a college freshman he ran that time. You could say a lot of things about his college times. Outside of him running a very fast 13:30 as a freshman he was never again in a “fast” college race on the track and he raced to win preferring to sit and kick. You could say two very talented runners such as Woody and Grant that weren’t over raced, over trained in college and were still able to perform well; once out of college and able to concentrate on training and racing they have done very very well. Jerry knew this. Woody showed his talent but was often injured. Grant showed his talent but was held back by his course load and his coach for his longer-term potential. Both guys situations in college have been well discussed on this site.
You could say Grant is also a 13:30 guy who somehow broke 12:50 under Jerry’s training 🤷His college PRs weren’t that impressive either.
Grant’s college to pro progression is better than Woody’s btw : 3:39/7:42/13:29 to 3:35/7:28/12:46/26:33
Woody: 3:43/7:48/13:32 to 3:37/7:38/12:58/27:12
Grant was a sub-4 guy in high school, and a national champ in college by his sophomore year. The talent level gap between the two is immense. Just looking at the PR's isn't telling you the whole story.
12:58 in a time trial and 13:05 at BU. One was a team time trial and the other almost. His best in a "real race" is 13:06. Still lots of improvement since college, but how much are the spikes worth at 5K?
12:58 in a time trial and 13:05 at BU. One was a team time trial and the other almost. His best in a "real race" is 13:06. Still lots of improvement since college, but how much are the spikes worth at 5K?
P.S. Awesome to watch him kick
Woody ran 12:58 in old school spikes. Further evidence that the 10+ second conversion some use on this site is idiotic.
12:58 in a time trial and 13:05 at BU. One was a team time trial and the other almost. His best in a "real race" is 13:06. Still lots of improvement since college, but how much are the spikes worth at 5K?
P.S. Awesome to watch him kick
Absolutely Woody is very talented (to those who detract), fast (to those who detract), has a great kick (from a race run in a certain time band), is a good guy (for those who have cared to listen to him speak). I wish him all the success in the world. He has made a decision to change coaches and his training environment. That decision could not have been easy given his major success at BTC under Jerry’s coaching and the natural friendships made with his team mates and knowing that environment of fast guys to train with made him better. Therefore, various conclusions can be drawn some of which are easy (Eugene move, less attention from coaching staff) or some thing(s) else. It is the some thing(s) else that we may never know about and if one reflects on major changes in their own life often it is the less obvious from the outside looking in that ultimately is the driver of the individual making their choice.
Several athletes and staff have left BTC in a very short time span. That is telling.
Shalane and her husband just adopted another baby as well so I don’t think her availability for coaching is going to be great with two little ones in the mix.
12:58 in a time trial and 13:05 at BU. One was a team time trial and the other almost. His best in a "real race" is 13:06. Still lots of improvement since college, but how much are the spikes worth at 5K?
P.S. Awesome to watch him kick
Woody ran 12:58 in old school spikes. Further evidence that the 10+ second conversion some use on this site is idiotic.
Woody ran 12:58 in prototype Dragon Flies, not the old spikes.
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