No. Going pro out of high school rarely (if ever) works for distance runners.
Look at the top performers list in any event 3000m or up. Tell me how far down the first name is that participated in NCAA. The opposite of what you say is true. Less true of mid-D. Not true at all for sprints.
Part of his deal involves college paid for by Adidas. He spent a few semesters taking classes online at CU Boulder, not sure if he ever finished. And its 300K base, incentives are separate (Altho I doubt he has hit many of the bonus incentives).
Source is I used to be friendly with the TME guys including Drew.
Sahlman just ran a pretty impressive 3:39 1500 in a good field, beating the likes of young collegian Nathan Green and even pro runner Waleed Suliman. At the end of the month, he will race at Pre Classic for the Men’s mile and run a 3:55-3:56 most likely. He’s already run sub-4 indoors and ran 14:03 on grass, he shouldn’t waste his time in college and should go pro immediately.
Alan Webb did go to college at George Mason University, he just didn't run on the team.
And don't forget that a few of the people who didn't use all of their college eligibility like Chris Lukezic had really good careers. I imagine Hobbs Kessler is getting the University of Michigan experience as a student
I think he should go to college for at least a year or two. I think he shouldn't go pro early until he wins NCAAs in multiple events indoors or outdoors.
With the shoes, pro-style training, and the shear number of sub 13:30s going off in the US this year, CS is just the first among many yet to come that will continue knocking down records. But despite these blazing performances, these are nowhere near global performance level and are only impressive at the national level.
As was stated in an earlier post, CS is still 10 seconds per mile slower than JI & Berenga were at the same age (and notably, those two ran that pace at 17 without super shoes yet). In fact, CS is still 5 seconds slower than Hobbs Kessler was last year, apples to apples! Kessler chose pro and is not exactly taking names and dominating anything anytime soon either.
CS should go to college and will actually see more success than Nico has in winning races and titles.
No. Going pro out of high school rarely (if ever) works for distance runners.
Look at the top performers list in any event 3000m or up. Tell me how far down the first name is that participated in NCAA. The opposite of what you say is true. Less true of mid-D. Not true at all for sprints.
I'm not sure why this is so hard for you guys to understand. I am specifically talking in the context of AMERICAN distance runners. Obviously if you are Kenyan or Ethiopian, then shipping halfway around the world to a foreign culture would be a BAD idea for your development.
If you're as good as Jakob, Barega, Cheptegei at the age of 18 (i.e. already qualifying for global championships) then obviously the NCAA will not help you. BUT, there have been ZERO American high schoolers at that level, aside from Jim Ryun (who did go to college).
So you are saying that he isn't close to world class which makes the case that if gets a large contract, he should take it because he may not get one after the sponsors realize this like they would have realized with Hunter.
The NCAA system causes coaches to focus on team success because that is how the coaches are incentivized and rewarded. Due to the large numbers of distance runners on feeder-system NCAA teams, the training typically lacks sufficient tailoring per individual. Although many athletes flourish in the NCAA system, it can be a poor choice in a purely athletic sense for star teenagers, who have often received highly individualized coaching attention in high school. The non-American club style systems tend to offer individualized coaching at all levels because coaches “win” when individual athletes accomplish things, not when a team does well in its conference, for example.
Colin should do what he wants after discussing with his parents.
That said, going to college will give him an education and time to mature. A 4 year scholarship is very valuable by itself (for NAU, maybe $40k/year x 4 is $160k). If he has the grades and values education more, he could pick an Ivy, Notre Dame or Stanford, like that, where tuition is around $70k/year.
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