What was that? Gudaf Tsegay runs like an IDIOT. Goes out in 59.93, Runs 4:11.89 mile!

Your options as an elite miler in the eyes of the letsrun degenerates:

1) Hang back and outkick your opponents in the last 100m... you're a boring tactician with no heart.

2) Take it out hard Pre-style and put on a brilliant show... you're an idiot.

3) Run a perfect race and win in a blazing fast time... you're a doper.

Stay classy, Letsrun!

She ran the smartest race at the whole meet! She broke Hull in the first 200m; Hull was already resigned to second. If she ran even splits, she would have lost.

I think the criticism is unwarranted. It seems that GT has more courage than the rest, and is experimenting here a bit, and learning from her experiments. I applaud her for not deciding she is going to follow the script you guys would have written for her.

If say, Hobbs Kessler had run a mile where he ran the first 440 in 53 and then hung on to win in 3:46 would there be a thread saying he ran like an IDIOT in all caps? I don’t know. Some might be praising him to the hill tops.

PB, WL, NR, MR

Don’t be too harsh on her

Actually the first 400 is free energy so you may as well run it fast.

What was she supposed to do? Go out a bit slower and run a 4:08 and still run the second fastest time ever? Who gives a sh*t? You've made your thoughts about a woman running sub 4 very clear so honestly who gives two flying f*cks about the difference between a 4:08 and 4:11 if you win the race?

That Championship race went out hard and killed off Hiltz and a couple others. It reminds me of a Kenyan tactic of old that used something like fartlek pacing to disrupt the opposition used to even pacing and unable to handle the surges. Opponents learned how handle it but it was effective.

opening lap 4 seconds quicker than laps 2 and 3 is not bad pacing at all, if you are trying to set a PR.

Stored ATP-CP is a use it or lose it thing. It's a free turbo boost to let you start faster with no drawbacks. You can't save it for later.

Then you only need to slow down once your acid levels get close to threshold, which can be nearly a lap for someone that well doped

anyhow the mile is a silly distance from silly old England

playing devil's advocate, if she'd reversed her splits (64/64/64/59) and run the same time, still winning, we'd be talking about an incredible kick. that said, she can probably crack 4:10 with a better paced race, but maybe she really thinks she's in world record shape. she's set some of those before, so tough to automatically doubt her. or, maybe she knows her only chance in a championship race is to go out hard, in which case, you better practice it. or, maybe rojo's right...

Yep. Similar to when Filbert Bayi first hit the big time. He would blast off and then hang on, many times running a very fast race even though staggering through some slow last laps. The rest of the world caught up, but only after they realized they needed to be ready to run much faster paces for the first half of the race.

Runner who lacks a good kick wins a DL race convincingly over the Olympic silver medalist. Runs second fastest time in history. Leads 13 of the 14 top finishes to PBs (and seven national records).

It’s only idiotic if it doesn’t work.

Its true that she won and got the second fastest mark in history, but I don't agree with this interpretation of the race. Hull did not work hard to catch up, she simply followed the pacer who was runing 4:09 - 4:10 pace, and then continued to follow the wave lights on that pace, even slightly slipping off. Tsegay simply fell back.

Tsegay could have taken the kick out of Hull by running with the pacer and then a 60 second 3rd lap.

Lastly I don't think Tsegay, who has run 1:57 for 800m is concerned with Jess Hull's kick. Jess's 800 PB is 1:58.

Tsegay has a history of running like this, this has nothing to do with Hull. Great talent.

Just in case you aren’t trolling…

If/when Mantz or Jakob or someone like them go out aggressively and fight to hang on, they’re called “a beast” or “gritty”…however when Tsegay does it, she’s called “an idiot”. You do realize that “front running” or “running hard from the gun” is a common racing tactic, right? It’s usually done in an effort to break your competitors early on in a race, or to run the closing speed out of the legs of an opponent whose kick you respect.

This is true. But she definitely would have been sub 4:10 if she kept with the pacer.

Might’ve run with best pacing: 4:08.63

A fairer comparison would be if Jakob did this. Tsegay has clearly been in 4:09 pace for the last several years, where as people would just be so over joyed that Kessler did so well that it would over shadow the pacing. I still think you make a good point, that even Jakob would not get this much hate for the off pacing.

What I don't understand is why didn't Tsegay ask for the wavelights and the pacer to be set to 4:07 pace, and go for the world record if she thinks she's in this kind of monster shape to be able to open in 59.

59-64-64-64 Would the first lap really make a difference?