Men’s 5k team: Wolfe or Blanks???

If Wolfe does not qualify on July 7th, he’s 100% out and McGorty is the alternate.

So that means that Fisher tamped down the pace purposely to help his friend McGorty. Parker got screwed. He certainly could have run under 13:05 with just a slightly faster pace.

Personally I think wolfe. If you medal at the trials, you should be going, and since blanks failed to medal, he shouldnt go.

That’s not how it works. This is not a judgment call. We can’t send a runner that doesn’t have the world standard or the world ranking. If there are scratches, he can go but if not we go to next in the qualifying process.

This very thread explains repeatedly why it isn't as simple as this. Because USATF honors the Trials order of finish, USATF will send Wolfe if we're able to, but he's on the cusp of being eligible or not by ranking, so if after scratches he still isn't high enough in the rankings to qualify, we literally cannot send him. Then we go back down the Trials finish order, and Blanks is next, and he has the auto standard so we send him instead. It's not USATF's choice, in effect the "decision" will be made by other nations scratching or not scratching athletes ahead of Wolfe.

Which would limit the US to two entries which makes no sense considering there are other athletes who've qualified to run in the Olympics by WA standards.

1. Self select based on the OTs in order of those who've met the qualifications.

2. Qualifications equal meeting a time standard or high enough ranking.

the best way of understanding it is the trials rank decides the order in which USATF reviews your times and ranking to verify whether you are olympic qualified. if you are top 3 you definitely get reviewed, and are effectively in if you have it.

and then from IOC/WA's end, they don't care how you pick them, but they have to be the right set of time/ ranked/ universality. so we can't just pick unqualified people based on trials podia.

It's an interesting thought though, about how much back and forth there can be. Does WA let USATF say, "we want to enter Wolfe if there are enough scratches, otherwise Blanks," and WA lets them know if there are enough scratches before they finalize the choice? Or is USATF stuck submitting their (potential) entries one time only, come what may? I actually don't know that aspect of it.

Umm, actually the IOC writes it 5000m on the schedule, as does iaaf on world rankings, so... Looks like the gold medal in pedantry goes to me

…so that McGorty can maybe become the alternate runner?

ok

So then, if Wolfe does not make it in, the next step is that Fisher opts out of the 5000m, so that McGorty can run at the Olympics.

Convoluted, but ok

BTW: scratches don’t look good at this point.

GBR presenting 3. Atkin, Dever and Mills (so no relevant scratches)

SWE presenting Almgren (only qualifier, so no relevant scratch)

RSA presenting Wildschutt (only qualifier, so no relevant scratch)

CAN presenting 3. Ahmed, Fafard and Flanagan.

FRA presenting 3 Gressier, Schrub and Hay

KEN, UGA and ETH will present 3 each surely

Kind of looking like Blanks is going to the Olympics

Correction. Abdi is a U.S. citizen.

Pure fitness-wise, this is a phenomenal question.

Parker Wolfe beat a 12:5x Olympian to win the NCAA 5k, as well as numerous pros/Blanks at the USA Trials. Blanks is the NCAA XC champ and is clearly gaining fitness FAST.

It’s the pathetic answer, but I think they’re a coin flip for best finish.

If Wolfe never makes an Olympic team (ever). How upset will he be at his coach? For how many years (decades)?

For the rest of his life:

Ya, I was a national calibre runner

Really? Did you ever make it to the Olympics ?

Well, no. I did make top 3 at the trials

Isn’t this all you need?

Well, no. You either need to run a time or make enough points.

Ok, so the time was really impossible to get. Only 2 guys got it?

Well, no. 9 Americans had it.

Really? pretty much everybody in that final had the standard and you ran faster than almost all of them and you didn’t have standard?

Well, I never ran in a fast race

ok, the qualification window was very small?

Well, no, it’s a 12 month window

ok, there were no fast races in the US?

Well, there were quite a few. Actually, a lot of international runners actually got their qualification time in the US

Ok, well why did you not run in any of these races?

Well, I don’t know

Ok, well what about the points. Did you have to run many races to get enough points and you were not able to get enough races in?

Well, no. You only needed 3 races.

ok, the trial race did not count for points?

Well, yes it did.

I guess the trial race was tactical and it didn’t really help you.

Well, no, I actually got a PB in that race. It was not particularly slow. I earned 1220 points in that race and I only needed an average of 1218 points to get in.

Weren’t you able to find other races that would have earned you points?

Well, I did one in the winter which earned me 1230 points. It was a 3000m

So you only needed one other race which would have earned you 1210 points?

Yes

why did you not do one that could earn you points? I mean, you had a whole year.

I don’t know

Well ok. I guess the Olympics are not very important in track anyway. What do you want in your coffee? Milk or cream?

Geez, this is depressing. Hope someone scratches.

To be fair, those 9 guys plus Kincaid plus Klecker were pretty good reason to focus on the NCAA and not the Olympics. He did run the BU season opener and was well behind Blanks in 13:13 - it would have seemed pretty desperate to come back to the very next BU meet and run the same race again. Outdoors just didn't pan out with any good qualifying attempt races - everyone else had already gotten the standard at BU by that point. The LA Grand Prix would have been right in between doubling at ACCs and NCAA regionals.

The play was to:

run the 3000m (not the 5000m ) at BU in early December

Then run the 5000m at BU at the end of Jan (instead of Penn mile)

Which is what Nico (Mike Smith) did

He did not have to double at ACC

Heath Baldwin did not compete at NCAA and is now an Olympian.

You always have “choices”

I agree, it was not obvious. He did not have the luxury that Canadian Thomas Fafard had for example (go to Europe in May). But it was not impossible

BTW: it looks like Beamish will be running the 5000m after all and AUS are presenting all their relevant runners (2) in the 5000m (McDonald and McSweyn)

at this point, it’s 99% sure that Blanks is in

He ran the 5 and the 10 at ACCs. Closing hard in the 5 to run 13:18