for a teenager to run 1'42 isn't incredible - i remember watching a 19y ole ben koech run 1'43.17 back in '94 in rieti & he did it with such ease that he looked capable of low-1'42 imminently & superstar status - it didn't pan out
the shock has been that we haven't had a helluva lot more africans not running 1'42
the list of 1'42 guys contains a lot of names who weren't particularly "frightening" - koskei, onyancha, nduriri, kimutai, yiampoy, tellez, etc
if guys like these coud chase kip around into 1'42s & superstars like ereng & konchellah coudn't indicates some poor time-chasing - pacing foremost
you can count on fingers of 1 hand number of times where guy goes thru in 50s & really tries to keep the pace going to 600 in 1'16
usually they drift out to 1'17.5+ & then try to charge the last 200 for usually nothing better than 1'44 - it's not the way to run a 1'42
we've recently seen guys like kaki, greg konchellah & borza actually trying to keep going hard to 600 & hang on & these guys are being rewarded with 1'42s
now they've got the right mindset for the race, i'd expect a few others joining them in the 1'42