Ritz has a World Cross medal. He eats your balls for breakfast.
Ritz has a World Cross medal. He eats your balls for breakfast.
watch the replay wrote:
Walter White wrote:US Cross Team
1) Rupp
2) Derrick
3) True
4) Mack
5) Ritz
6) Solinsky
7) Sam Chelanga when given citizenship
Tough to beat
Ritz is not doing world cross, he made a blog post about it last year
Solinsky is done
Chelanga probably won't have citizenship by then
0% chance of Rupp doing cross
Probably true, but for fantasy sake let's pretend they would be interested. I'd say Replace Solinsky with Teg. It would be a phenomenal team.
douglas burke wrote:
some would argue world cross country is even harder than the olympics, so its a big deal.
when you think about it, world cross country is harder than the olympics and world track is about the same or even harder than the olympics because the defending champ and/or diamond league winner gets a spot in the world track champs so possibly 4 kenyans and 4 ethiopians in the distance events and 4 jamaicans in the sprint, whereas the olympics limits each country to 3 athletes.
the olympics though gets 1000 times the hype.
I maintain that the Olympics always brings out the serious dopers, making it harder, i.e. Makhloufi, Turkish 1500 women, etc.
Chris Derrick was born for xc
Solinsky should revive his career with xc.
survey says wrote:
Ritz has a World Cross medal. He eats your balls for breakfast.
Ritz is very good at cross when he's fully fit, but he isn't fully fit right now. I guess if he decided to make a big push with a focus on world cross he might get ahead of Jager and Mead, but right now those two guys are just plain better than he is.
I find it sad that Ritz skipped this past world cross when he was fully fit. And for what? A minor pay day at the NYC Half.
Anyway, it seems likely that the actual US team will look a lot like this past one: Derrick, True + a bunch of perfectly good guys who aren't at the Rupp - Ritz - Jager - Mead level.
dkny64 wrote:
survey says wrote:Ritz has a World Cross medal. He eats your balls for breakfast.
Ritz is very good at cross when he's fully fit, but he isn't fully fit right now. I guess if he decided to make a big push with a focus on world cross he might get ahead of Jager and Mead, but right now those two guys are just plain better than he is.
I find it sad that Ritz skipped this past world cross when he was fully fit. And for what? A minor pay day at the NYC Half.
Anyway, it seems likely that the actual US team will look a lot like this past one: Derrick, True + a bunch of perfectly good guys who aren't at the Rupp - Ritz - Jager - Mead level.
p.s. I think that US team - Derrick, True, Rupp, Ritz, Jager, Mead - would actually be competitive with true A teams from Kenya and Ethiopia. Kenya would still be the clear favorite but they'd have to actually execute on race day to win against that US team, and Ethiopia doesn't have great depth right now.
dkny64 wrote:
dkny64 wrote:Ritz is very good at cross when he's fully fit, but he isn't fully fit right now. I guess if he decided to make a big push with a focus on world cross he might get ahead of Jager and Mead, but right now those two guys are just plain better than he is.
I find it sad that Ritz skipped this past world cross when he was fully fit. And for what? A minor pay day at the NYC Half.
Anyway, it seems likely that the actual US team will look a lot like this past one: Derrick, True + a bunch of perfectly good guys who aren't at the Rupp - Ritz - Jager - Mead level.
p.s. I think that US team - Derrick, True, Rupp, Ritz, Jager, Mead - would actually be competitive with true A teams from Kenya and Ethiopia. Kenya would still be the clear favorite but they'd have to actually execute on race day to win against that US team, and Ethiopia doesn't have great depth right now.
I agree, but I feel if healthy and focused on the event, Teg could beat True and Jager and Mead.
With every American distance runner in the prime... who ya got? Rupp, Pre, Derrick, Solinsky, Ritz, Goucher, and Meb.
Teg is 32 and hasn't posted a fast time at something as short as 12k since 2012. MAYBE he could beat Mead at 12k xc, but I really don't think he's competitive with True or Jager anymore. Teg has had a fine career, but I think the end is near.
Walter White wrote:
With every American distance runner in the prime... who ya got? Rupp, Pre, Derrick, Solinsky, Ritz, Goucher, and Meb.
Virgin
dkny64 wrote:
Teg is 32 and hasn't posted a fast time at something as short as 12k since 2012. MAYBE he could beat Mead at 12k xc, but I really don't think he's competitive with True or Jager anymore. Teg has had a fine career, but I think the end is near.
I agree with you regarding him being in the twilight, but xc is different. Guts and experience to come into play, and he certainly has those. Don't know for sure, but I believe he would show up damn strong in world xc. Mead has something to prove to me for this. He seems to run well when thing are feeling good, but when they aren't he really goes out the back.
Walter White wrote:
With every American distance runner in the prime... who ya got? Rupp, Pre, Derrick, Solinsky, Ritz, Goucher, and Meb.
As another mentioned, Virgin deserves the nod based on performance in xc. In the modern era however with the level of running being what it is, that is a really good question. Definitely not Solinsky or Meb, as good as they were. And yeah, I know Meb had some great finishes at world XC. Ritz and Goucher were xc monsters WHEN healthy and certainly better than Meb. I'd lean toward one of them, but Rupp is a big unknown. He ran very well in XC his last two years of college despite coming back from summer intl championships when others were gearing for XC. Sam Chelanga is no slouch and Galen handled him nicely while running a short xc season. With his 26:44 and what he did in college he potentially could be the one, but sadly I doubt we'll ever know unless he races one later in his career when he's totally done with the track.
True and Derrick's performance in '13 was pretty exciting. I'd be happy just to see them improve on that. US & World XC championships is such a great opportunity for comeback stories. German Fernandez, for example, used to say XC was his favorite sport. Would love to see him run US. Ritz is on the comeback and after a fall marathon would absolutely be able to perform well in XC, but it sounds like he doesn't plan to. Too bad, it would likely be his last chance for any kind of championship medal, despite his hopes for marathon success.
Perspectivation wrote:
Walter White wrote:With every American distance runner in the prime... who ya got? Rupp, Pre, Derrick, Solinsky, Ritz, Goucher, and Meb.
As another mentioned, Virgin deserves the nod based on performance in xc. In the modern era however with the level of running being what it is, that is a really good question. Definitely not Solinsky or Meb, as good as they were. And yeah, I know Meb had some great finishes at world XC. Ritz and Goucher were xc monsters WHEN healthy and certainly better than Meb. I'd lean toward one of them, but Rupp is a big unknown. He ran very well in XC his last two years of college despite coming back from summer intl championships when others were gearing for XC. Sam Chelanga is no slouch and Galen handled him nicely while running a short xc season. With his 26:44 and what he did in college he potentially could be the one, but sadly I doubt we'll ever know unless he races one later in his career when he's totally done with the track.
Gotta give Bob Kennedy some serious consideration. I still don't understand how he managed to go from being a low-mileage HS 1M / 2M / 5k xc guy to an NCAA xc champ as a true freshman.
dkny64 wrote:
Gotta give Bob Kennedy some serious consideration. I still don't understand how he managed to go from being a low-mileage HS 1M / 2M / 5k xc guy to an NCAA xc champ as a true freshman.
How many miles per week was he running as a college freshman? And what were his highschool PRs?
Brilliant? You must not be very intelligent. The word that you were searching for is stupid. You're welcome.
What no way wrote:
Had to be said wrote:Is it Rupp-certified?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha you are original and Hilarious oh man....stop really, Rupp certified.... Wow, so good "it had to be said" so brilliant. Take that NOPers #truth...I love this web site
dkny64 wrote:
Perspectivation wrote:As another mentioned, Virgin deserves the nod based on performance in xc. In the modern era however with the level of running being what it is, that is a really good question. Definitely not Solinsky or Meb, as good as they were. And yeah, I know Meb had some great finishes at world XC. Ritz and Goucher were xc monsters WHEN healthy and certainly better than Meb. I'd lean toward one of them, but Rupp is a big unknown. He ran very well in XC his last two years of college despite coming back from summer intl championships when others were gearing for XC. Sam Chelanga is no slouch and Galen handled him nicely while running a short xc season. With his 26:44 and what he did in college he potentially could be the one, but sadly I doubt we'll ever know unless he races one later in his career when he's totally done with the track.
Gotta give Bob Kennedy some serious consideration. I still don't understand how he managed to go from being a low-mileage HS 1M / 2M / 5k xc guy to an NCAA xc champ as a true freshman.
Kennedy did run world cross country, but wasn't the top US guy. His 10K on the track wasn't spectacular either but he never really attacked both events in his prime so it's not easy to know. Curious who the top 5 were when he won NCAA as a frosh.
1: Bob Kennedy 29:20
2: Yehezkel Halifa 29:21
3: Bo Reed 29:24
4: Thomas O'Gara 29:28
5: Chris Zinn 29:31
Is World XC still as not of a deal as it was in the '90s/early 2000s, when ALL of the best Africans, and guys like Geb, Tergat, Bekele (best XC runner ever, no contest), and El G (did he run Senior, or just Junior) ran it every year?
world cross is every other year now which I think is a shame