Are Ethiopians finally going to start taking mid-distances?

WTFever, dude. It IS different when naturalized citizens do it because the point is having PRODUCTS, NOT IMPORTS, of a certain country performing well. This is not a citizenship issue, so don't go there. If Kenny B., Shihine, et alia became U.S. citizens today, does that mean they are products of our system, from birth? Of course not. What a joke.

Brad ONeil - SR - Coe College wrote:

static cling wrote:

but then you run into the naturalized citizen debate, etc..

Only if you're a jackass.

Brad ONeil = Trolly McTroll Troll

Thomas Halsey wrote:

Yes the EPOpians will do better now that Diack gave them the all clear or maybe we should just call it the clear.

Diack is Senegalese and, like everyone else in Monaco, cares about making money. Ethiopia has no capital to invest in athletics. Your logic is shit.

save it wrote:

WTFever, dude. It IS different when naturalized citizens do it because the point is having PRODUCTS, NOT IMPORTS, of a certain country performing well. This is not a citizenship issue, so don't go there. If Kenny B., Shihine, et alia became U.S. citizens today, does that mean they are products of our system, from birth? Of course not. What a joke.

Salazar is a naturalized citizen. Same with Sanya Richards, Colleen De Reuck, Magdalena Lewy, Mark Plaatjes, and Kerron Clement.

fawn lebowitz wrote:

Thomas Halsey wrote:

Yes the EPOpians will do better now that Diack gave them the all clear or maybe we should just call it the clear.

Diack is Senegalese and, like everyone else in Monaco, cares about making money. Ethiopia has no capital to invest in athletics. Your logic is shit.

What are you talking about Jos Hermans and Bekele making millions from endorsements. Thousands of Ethiopians show up to European meets, bringing in millions a year in rev.

If Bek was doped fewer EPOpians would show up to root on their favorite Dope.

lol, you seen upset, Whetstine, got some more athletes to ruin and drugs to sell?

just a couple of sidenotes kalkedan gezahegn ran a 1500 time in rome yesterdayof 4:04 her date of birth is 1991, and today at world youth geta dima was second i n 4:15, nelly ngeiywo of kenya ran 4:12 to win, chelsey sveinsson of the usa was 4th in 4:20.

ethhiopia has 5 junior girls under 4:15 this year.

Thomas Halsey wrote:

fawn lebowitz wrote:

Diack is Senegalese and, like everyone else in Monaco, cares about making money. Ethiopia has no capital to invest in athletics. Your logic is shit.

What are you talking about Jos Hermans and Bekele making millions from endorsements. Thousands of Ethiopians show up to European meets, bringing in millions a year in rev.

If Bek was doped fewer EPOpians would show up to root on their favorite Dope

lol, you seen upset, Whetstine, got some more athletes to ruin and drugs to sell?

Oh yes, and Jos can totally control and fix everything for his athletes. When Bekele races in the US, at Worlds, at the Olympics, he totally has the fix in.

Ethiopians showing up at meets in Europe do not bring in "millions." If we're talking about Bekele, he'll likely run Hengelo, Oslo, Rome, Paris, Zurich and Brussels and maybe the GP Final. Unlikely he'll run London as the Ethiopian Federation will have called everyone back home by then. At any one of those meets in Europe, I am sure that there are no more than 1000 Ethiopians in attendance. You may think there are more because they standout with their national colours but having been to all those meets myself, they're just concentrated in one area. 1000 Ethiopians x 6 meets x 60€ a ticket = 360,000€. Wow. That's the cost of having Bolt at one meet.

You see the gaps in your reasoning?

fawn lebowitz wrote:

Salazar is a naturalized citizen. Same with Sanya Richards, Colleen De Reuck, Magdalena Lewy, Mark Plaatjes, and Kerron Clement.

None of them had the advantage of growing up at altitude near the equator. Apples and oranges. This tangent should probably have its own thread, but still apples and oranges, nonetheless.

save it wrote:

fawn lebowitz wrote:

Salazar is a naturalized citizen. Same with Sanya Richards, Colleen De Reuck, Magdalena Lewy, Mark Plaatjes, and Kerron Clement.

None of them had the advantage of growing up at altitude near the equator. Apples and oranges. This tangent should probably have its own thread, but still apples and oranges, nonetheless.

lots of places in south africa are at altitude and the weather is very good for distance running, so dereuck and plaatjes fit that category.

clement from trinidad, richards from jamaica and salazar from cuba all born near the equator.

none of those mentioned have likely faced the extreme poverty and hardships of ethiopian runners, example 20% of ethiopiansdont live to see their 5th birthday.

the ethiopian runners who are successful get their in spite of their disadvantages, not because of advantages. maybe the most amazing thing going in sports ever.

there.

i know

1st, you'd have to tell us how much is "serious money"

they get paid well to run 5k ( or 3k ) & unless the money to run 1500 is at least double that, it's not worth moving from 5k, especially in previous years with ruskies at 3'55/3'56 & a likely beating from them - fear of getting beat is probably main reason for them to have avoided it

as for 1500 being less popular back home, they clearly have no perspective of the prestige of middle-distance events on the world stage :

the 1500 is the jewel in the crown of any distance event ( track not road ), followed then maybe by 800/5k of probably equal merit & lastly a probable tie between 3ksc/10k

if the worldwide prestige of the 1500 hasn't filtered thru to those backwaters, it's their problem

as for JW, he is running the 400 which is a far more prestigious event than 800

only track geeks are asking him to run 800 - marketing companies, his manager, coach aren't - 400 is helluva lot more marketable event than 800

save it wrote:

fawn lebowitz wrote:

Salazar is a naturalized citizen. Same with Sanya Richards, Colleen De Reuck, Magdalena Lewy, Mark Plaatjes, and Kerron Clement.

None of them had the advantage of growing up at altitude near the equator. Apples and oranges. This tangent should probably have its own thread, but still apples and oranges, nonetheless.

Actually, Colleen De Reuck's home town in South Africa sits more than 1000m above sea-level. The same is true for Ryan Hall and Adam Goucher so they don't count with the rest of the Americans either?

Most are too old.

But why does the 1500m fee need to be a whole 100% greater when the nature of the event allows them to run it much more frequently?

The marathon is king of them all in Ethiopia, followed by the 10000m and 5000m. Which is why men with 3:30 speed, like Gebrselassie, have focused on the 10000m, and women with 3:55 potential, like Defar and Dibaba, are focused on 5000m and 10000m.

fawn lebowitz wrote:

But why does the 1500m fee need to be a whole 100% greater when the nature of the event allows them to run it much more frequently?

it woud need to be a significant amount greater than the fee for 3k/5k to compensate them for a likely thrashing from a 3'55/3'56 ruskie in days of yore ( & they alternate 5k.3k on a frequent basis on circuit )

The marathon is king of them all in Ethiopia, followed by the 10000m and 5000m. Which is why men with 3:30 speed, like Gebrselassie, have focused on the 10000m, and women with 3:55 potential, like Defar and Dibaba, are focused on 5000m and 10000m.

apart from geb who is a guy moving up, the thopys haven't had an intrinsic class M runner since that guy who won gold in '00/'01 - their M cupboard is pretty bare without geb ( he won't be around much more ) - that is a poor return if your number 1 event is the M

geb didn't have 3'30 speed & moved up to 5k/10k

he was more like a 3'33/3'34 guy at best in early '90s but his time got down to 3'30 because of the huge endurance improvements he made in 5k/10k

similarly with the gals, they were likely 4'00/4'01 gals in early career but huge endurance improvements over 3k/5k/10k have got them down to likely 3'56

on paper neither geb nor the gals have good enough basic speed to run world beating 1500s - probably 49/50 for geb & 55/56 for the gals when likes of hicham/bernie/noah/etc can go 47/48 & masterkova/holmes/recent ruskies can go 53/54

the reason they didn't try 1500 wouda been because their coach probably looked at their basic 400/800 times when they started out & told them they were too slow to be world-beating over 1500 - find a longer distance

incredible endurance work has compensated for lack of 400/800 speed & got them to 3'30 & 3'56 - but those still aren't WRs...

Except for your reasoning that the Russians effectively scared off potential Ethiopian threats in the 1500m, I largely agree with your analysis.

Abera's chronic achilles injuries were a huge blow, and it's only been recently that they've started to come back with Kebede and Merga in the men's marathon.

I agree, both Geb and Bekele would only barely be able to break 50sec for 400m, just as Defar and Dibaba are probably just under 56sec. Still, with Dibaba's ability to run 4:06 at the end of her 5000m WR, and Defar's 91sec final 600m in her 14:12 PB from last year, they're both candidates to win a world or Olympic title at 1500m.

Maybe next year they'll be persuaded to have a serious go at it.

I thought the 5000 and 10000 WERE middle distances..

bekele can close a 10k in 52 why wouldnt he be able to run a 48?

DOGGPOUND wrote:

bekele can close a 10k in 52 why wouldnt he be able to run a 48?

Because he isn't running 52 at the end of a 5000m or 10000m because he's really quick, he's running it because he is so aerobically fit that all the previous laps in the low 60s haven't taxed him as much as his competitors and he's able to run the last 400m or 200m much closer to his all-out speed than the others.

Besides, once you get to sub48 territory, the runner in question probably has too much fast-twitch content to be able to run 26:30. It's the same reason Michael Johnson couldn't run a fast 1500m or 5000m. He may be a 43.1 400m runner, but that doesn't mean he'll be able to run 12 laps at 63sec pace and then close with a 20flat 200m.