Hobbs Kessler: "I think what we should be focused on is titles, big meets, and not running fast at BU."

unearned cockyness yep

the behavior can be corrected. if ingrained at an early age, the prognosis for change is zero. that said, they can learn to "say the right thing"

in business and life, there are too many covert cocky narcissists of this behavior

these MFs are beyond annoying at the bare minimum

Kessler won a bronze medal at world indoors last year

The issue is winning titles and placing top 3 at the trials/USAs doesn’t guarantee a spot at the Olympics/Worlds and if you didn’t make the outdoor championships because you never carved out a day to get the qualifiers out of the way, you season was a wash. Parker Wolfe beat Blanks at NCAAs for the title and then again at the trials, but who went to the Olympics? I bet Wolfe had wished he’d run fast at BU or some other fast meet.

Millrose titles and indoor USA wins mean nothing if you don’t make it to the global outdoor championship that year and that’s just a fact.

Yeah, and he got ripped on here by many, many posters who claimed he was "done". So now he's "doing it" and he can't comment on his own thoughts? BS dude!

I was called a moron for saying he's far from over....but now they naysayers have slid back under their slimy rocks.

He's just repeating what every elite athlete says. Other than Jakob, everyone is far more concerned with winning medals than running quick times (though I guess Jakob actually wins medals as well). Centro will always be Olympic champ and no one cares that he never broke 3:30 or even held any national records, let alone world records.

I agree completely. My comment about the increased time between the world indoor championships and the U.S. outdoor championships this year was specifically about Kessler, who (I believe, please correct me if I'm wrong), already has the standard for his events (or at least has no problem getting it) and isn't committed to running Grand Slam Track. Unless Kessler has another early spring racing commitment that I'm not aware of, it seems that running the world indoor championships should be feasible for his overall 2025 calendar as it was last year. I would also think he'd benefit from the experience of going over to that side of the world to race in a championship setting. That experience could benefit him later this year in Tokyo.

Centro won a big upset due to tactical reasons. He was far from the best from that era and that is a fact.

His season was a wash because he has a superior winning record against Blanks? That’s hilarious bro.

A wash is a bit much, and he had a successful season, but Blanks made it to the biggest stage in track and field and Wolfe did not. He certainly could have made it there, but he didn't have the qualifier. Athletes should certainly focus on knocking out their qualifiers as early as possible so that after that, they can focus on other fun things like tactical racing or medals.

My point is that he shouldn't be telling us he sucks and that he's disappointed when he runs 7:35 in a season opener and then 3:46, only losing to the Olympic bronze medalist in a new world record time. These are great performances for him and obviously he wants to win but running 3:46 and breaking the old world record shouldn't be "pretty disappointing" for someone at his level. Saying that it is makes him come across as cocky and unhappy.

100%. We somehow have a system where a middling pro who goes fractions under the standard but comes from a country like Canada or Belgium is a shoo-in to make the biggest stage in sports while a 12:40 Ethiopian and collegian beating 5 guys with the standard has to watch. So we’re gonna blame Teare for controlling his destiny?

On one hand he has a solid point.

On the other hand you have the Parker Wolfe situation last year. I'm sure he would have loved to dedicate the time to get a qualifying standard last year.

Hocker has GST constraints, so getting the 5K standard out of the way now isn't a terrible idea, given as he doesn't have much to prove at USA Indoors anyways.

Similarily, I'd expect Fisher to skip USA/World Indoors to prep for The TEN or to try and grab a 10K standard elsewhere

Teare on the other hand, doesn't have GST constraints, and is likely to race a few 5K's pre-USA's anyways (LA Grand Prix likely), so I don't really see the rush to pick up the standard now.

Teare would also benefit from a USA indoor win more than the other two at this stage in his career.

Timothy Cheruiyot, Emmanuel Wanyonyi and Asbel Kiprop...

this mf said tittles

Someone probably already said this, but I bet Parker Wolfe wish he ran more at BU so he went to the Olympics instead of Graham Blanks.

Grant Fisher has the 10K standard, so he’s skipping more because the GST calendar doesn’t align with World Indoors.

Ahhh...Welcome to the world of being a professional runner. This isn't new, in fact it has been a part of USA Track and Field for decades. Every off-season, coach, athlete and agent (manager) sit down and lay out the race plan for the upcoming year. What is the "Main" goal(s) for the season, do we run X-C or indoors, or bit of both, when do we want to open up the outdoor season, etc... A question that always comes up is "Do we have the qualifier", whether it's for Trials, USA's, the Olympics, and or World Champs. Having the qualifier from the previous season was key, you then didn't have the pressure to run a qualifying time and could just train and race to be top 3 at USA's. My thought was always to try and set up a fast race(s) prior to USA's every year. If you were struggling to run the qualifying time before USA's or soon thereafter, you really weren't ready to compete at major meets. Of course, this was difficult for athletes who were injured the previous season or were not running well, and didn't have a qualifier, and then had to hunt for a fast race somewhere before the deadline, including Europe which wasn't ideal but there was no other choice. Winning titles in my view should be the priority, especially USA nationals where the national teams are selected. You may be the fastest in the field, but are you ready for a slow tactical race and be top 3? It's a true balancing act that requires a lot of preparation and planning. If all goes well, you knock out a fast time going into USA's and just race for a spot on Team USA. If you really want to cut it close, run the qualifier in the USA Championship race. Easier for the sprints, not so much for distances.

Its ideal to have the qualifier but not necessarily necessary. If a runner needs it after placing top 3 at USAs, a paced time trial can be organized for them to get it.

I would like to see more people run world indoors, but I don't blame the athletes that decide not to. They're just responding to incentives, and right now the importance of world indoors from a reputation (and therefore monetary) perspective is nowhere close to outdoor worlds.

I think track could support two world championships of equal importance every year, with one being indoors. Maybe you could do a road 10K or half marathon at the same time too as part of it. But for something like that to happen it's not going to be driven by the athletes, all the shoe companies would have to get together and decide they're actually going to reward athletes for going to world indoors to the same extent they do outdoors. And as others have said, they should tweak how qualifying works so there isn't such an emphasis on time trials. An easy example would be to allow 3k times to be used to qualify for the 5k outdoors.