A moderate opinion for a respectful debate (please) on JI’s WR attempts next year

Steen Fastenbender wrote:

This is an awesomely ironic post starting with "You always know who's talking out of their A$", that then goes on to say he's "never been a high mileage guy" that trains smart and efficient. Up to 115 miles per week isn't high mileage? 180+ km per week? "Talking out of their A$"?

But really if you weren't "Talking out of your A$" you'd know that the high mileage on it's own isn't really the issue, it's the high threshold volume, sometimes twice a day, which surely has a huge impact on his body. It's well known he doesn't do near the same amount of anaerobic work of the greats of the past such as El Guerrouj, Morceli, Aouita but on the flipside he has to do a much greater volume of work at just below or right at his threshold to improve it, a lot of which is done on the track. Factor in he's training for excellence at both the 1500m and 5000m which means he is doing large threshold level volumes for both distances, often on the same day. Mornings he might do 1500m work, evenings 5000m work. How you have deduced that he isn't a high mileage guy is beyond anyones guess. He is the ultimate high mileage 1500m runner.

He's now developing a pattern of achilles injuries, the primary cause of these are lower leg muscular stiffness and tightness. You don't think that might be linked to the huge threshold volume he's doing on the track in his blubber soft Alphafly trainers?

If his "speed development is complete for the most part" then he has no shot at the 1500m record. Even assuming when he was in 3.26.7 shape he was capable of running 1.44.5 for the 800m, to break 3.26.0 that needs to be well under 1.44.

Your post would have been fine if you didn't rudely come up all guns blazing trying to blow up everyone else and how they are talking out of the A

s when your knowledge is severely lacking in it's own right.

Rubio wrote:

First of all: I’d love for all three records to be broken, because witnessing a world record is a privilege. I don’t care if it’s a European, an African, an American, or a New Zealander.
Well, actually, I’d prefer it to be Jakob in all of them because that would be legendary.

There’s been a lot of debate on this forum about whether he’s past his peak, if he’ll never get back to his 2024 form... no one really knows that. The only factual thing we can say (even though correlation doesn't mean causation and all that) is that the current and/or recent records in this era in the 1500, the mile, and the 5000 were set by athletes who were even younger than him.
Jakob is very young (he’ll be 26 or about to turn 26) in a sport where the absolute top level seems to happen at an absurdly even younger age.

5000 WR
I had my doubts, but several users here have convinced me that Jakob is the best-suited athlete in history to sustain 60" laps.
And he could also set a time trial under better conditions: the last pacer dropped Joshua before 2500m, and he ran the fastest laps alone.
It would be an insane performance because, when they set their WRs/PBs, Bekele was 23, Chep 23, Komen 21, and only Geb was 25.*

1500 WR
Jakob won't get better conditions: El G had perfect pacing up to about 1200m and flawless splits.
He was 23 years old. Beating that record at 26-ish (Lagat's PB came at that age) would be beyond awesome.

MILE WR
It’s considered a slightly weaker record than the 1500 according to the scoring tables**, but it was set in a race that went all the way to a final sprint against Ngeny. Those conditions are practically impossible for Jakob to replicate.
El G was 24 years old.

*I know I’ve left out Hagos (who was 30), but that was because his PB came in the greatest 5000m race in history. And Kejelcha was 26. Expecting to replicate that unicorn race without Aregawi, Kiplimo, Barega, Kejelcha himself... would be naïve.
**For those of you who have competed at a decent level in the 1500/mile: can you confirm that your mile PBs are actually closer to El G’s ratio compared to your 1500s?

TL;DR: Like most people, I think Jakob’s best chances are in the 5000. And I’m not talking about flirting with 12:30. I mean running at WR pace all the way to the last lap and closing faster than Joshua, who “only” managed a 59.64 finish.
If he were to break any of these WRs, it wouldn’t just be the best performance ever in those distances -duh- but even more outlier and extraordinary for achieving it at, or very close to, 26 years old.

Rubio wrote:

First of all: I’d love for all three records to be broken, because witnessing a world record is a privilege. I don’t care if it’s a European, an African, an American, or a New Zealander.
Well, actually, I’d prefer it to be Jakob in all of them because that would be legendary.

There’s been a lot of debate on this forum about whether he’s past his peak, if he’ll never get back to his 2024 form... no one really knows that. The only factual thing we can say (even though correlation doesn't mean causation and all that) is that the current and/or recent records in this era in the 1500, the mile, and the 5000 were set by athletes who were even younger than him.
Jakob is very young (he’ll be 26 or about to turn 26) in a sport where the absolute top level seems to happen at an absurdly even younger age.

5000 WR
I had my doubts, but several users here have convinced me that Jakob is the best-suited athlete in history to sustain 60" laps.
And he could also set a time trial under better conditions: the last pacer dropped Joshua before 2500m, and he ran the fastest laps alone.
It would be an insane performance because, when they set their WRs/PBs, Bekele was 23, Chep 23, Komen 21, and only Geb was 25.*

1500 WR
Jakob won't get better conditions: El G had perfect pacing up to about 1200m and flawless splits.
He was 23 years old. Beating that record at 26-ish (Lagat's PB came at that age) would be beyond awesome.

MILE WR
It’s considered a slightly weaker record than the 1500 according to the scoring tables**, but it was set in a race that went all the way to a final sprint against Ngeny. Those conditions are practically impossible for Jakob to replicate.
El G was 24 years old.

*I know I’ve left out Hagos (who was 30), but that was because his PB came in the greatest 5000m race in history. And Kejelcha was 26. Expecting to replicate that unicorn race without Aregawi, Kiplimo, Barega, Kejelcha himself... would be naïve.
**For those of you who have competed at a decent level in the 1500/mile: can you confirm that your mile PBs are actually closer to El G’s ratio compared to your 1500s?

TL;DR: Like most people, I think Jakob’s best chances are in the 5000. And I’m not talking about flirting with 12:30. I mean running at WR pace all the way to the last lap and closing faster than Joshua, who “only” managed a 59.64 finish.
If he were to break any of these WRs, it wouldn’t just be the best performance ever in those distances -duh- but even more outlier and extraordinary for achieving it at, or very close to, 26 years old.

Aouita 84 wrote:

Rubio wrote:

First of all: I’d love for all three records to be broken, because witnessing a world record is a privilege. I don’t care if it’s a European, an African, an American, or a New Zealander.
Well, actually, I’d prefer it to be Jakob in all of them because that would be legendary.

There’s been a lot of debate on this forum about whether he’s past his peak, if he’ll never get back to his 2024 form... no one really knows that. The only factual thing we can say (even though correlation doesn't mean causation and all that) is that the current and/or recent records in this era in the 1500, the mile, and the 5000 were set by athletes who were even younger than him.
Jakob is very young (he’ll be 26 or about to turn 26) in a sport where the absolute top level seems to happen at an absurdly even younger age.

5000 WR
I had my doubts, but several users here have convinced me that Jakob is the best-suited athlete in history to sustain 60" laps.
And he could also set a time trial under better conditions: the last pacer dropped Joshua before 2500m, and he ran the fastest laps alone.
It would be an insane performance because, when they set their WRs/PBs, Bekele was 23, Chep 23, Komen 21, and only Geb was 25.*

1500 WR
Jakob won't get better conditions: El G had perfect pacing up to about 1200m and flawless splits.
He was 23 years old. Beating that record at 26-ish (Lagat's PB came at that age) would be beyond awesome.

MILE WR
It’s considered a slightly weaker record than the 1500 according to the scoring tables**, but it was set in a race that went all the way to a final sprint against Ngeny. Those conditions are practically impossible for Jakob to replicate.
El G was 24 years old.

*I know I’ve left out Hagos (who was 30), but that was because his PB came in the greatest 5000m race in history. And Kejelcha was 26. Expecting to replicate that unicorn race without Aregawi, Kiplimo, Barega, Kejelcha himself... would be naïve.
**For those of you who have competed at a decent level in the 1500/mile: can you confirm that your mile PBs are actually closer to El G’s ratio compared to your 1500s?

TL;DR: Like most people, I think Jakob’s best chances are in the 5000. And I’m not talking about flirting with 12:30. I mean running at WR pace all the way to the last lap and closing faster than Joshua, who “only” managed a 59.64 finish.
If he were to break any of these WRs, it wouldn’t just be the best performance ever in those distances -duh- but even more outlier and extraordinary for achieving it at, or very close to, 26 years old.

You always know who's talking out of their A$ when they say "Ohhh...Jakob is too old, he's burnt out and his best running days are behind him". At 26 years old you're literally beginning to peak. The haters will respond with "He started competing when he was too young, he's burnt out....blah...blah...blah. A couple of things to consider, Jakob was never a high mileage guy with training, and has been very careful and diligent by training smart and efficient. He's now at the stage of his career where he's both mentally and physically tempered and can maximize his absolute potential. Yes, I believe the 5000m is his true sweet spot. His speed development is complete for the most part, maybe a tweak here and there, but in reality he's pretty much maxed out. I think in a well paced 1500m/Mile in good conditions, with great competition, he can squeeze out a WR. On the other hand, the 5000m is low hanging fruit. With the past year's outdoor injury issue, Jakob was able to recharge both mentally and physically and gain a true perspective on his running career and motivation. I'm predicting a HUGE "bounce back" season which will produce some amazing times, and a WR in the 5000m. If he breaks the 5000m WR, he's truly achieved G.O.A.T status without doubt.

justanothercuriousdude wrote:

Steen Fastenbender wrote:

This is an awesomely ironic post starting with "You always know who's talking out of their A$", that then goes on to say he's "never been a high mileage guy" that trains smart and efficient. Up to 115 miles per week isn't high mileage? 180+ km per week? "Talking out of their A$"?

But really if you weren't "Talking out of your A$" you'd know that the high mileage on it's own isn't really the issue, it's the high threshold volume, sometimes twice a day, which surely has a huge impact on his body. It's well known he doesn't do near the same amount of anaerobic work of the greats of the past such as El Guerrouj, Morceli, Aouita but on the flipside he has to do a much greater volume of work at just below or right at his threshold to improve it, a lot of which is done on the track. Factor in he's training for excellence at both the 1500m and 5000m which means he is doing large threshold level volumes for both distances, often on the same day. Mornings he might do 1500m work, evenings 5000m work. How you have deduced that he isn't a high mileage guy is beyond anyones guess. He is the ultimate high mileage 1500m runner.

He's now developing a pattern of achilles injuries, the primary cause of these are lower leg muscular stiffness and tightness. You don't think that might be linked to the huge threshold volume he's doing on the track in his blubber soft Alphafly trainers?

If his "speed development is complete for the most part" then he has no shot at the 1500m record. Even assuming when he was in 3.26.7 shape he was capable of running 1.44.5 for the 800m, to break 3.26.0 that needs to be well under 1.44.

Your post would have been fine if you didn't rudely come up all guns blazing trying to blow up everyone else and how they are talking out of the A

s when your knowledge is severely lacking in it's own right.

I like your post. But here I will focus only on this paragraph: “He's now developing a pattern of achilles injuries, the primary cause of these are lower leg muscular stiffness and tightness. You don't think that might be linked to the huge threshold volume he's doing on the track in his blubber soft Alphafly trainers?”

So here are my comments: There are especially three other athletes I know of who do/have done the same type of threshold training as Jakob (I don’t include Almgren here; I think his training and focus differ too much in periods): Jakob’s two older brothers, Henrik and Filip, and their fellow countryman Narve Nordås. Well, we know that the brothers are even more injury ridden than Jakob (a lot of Achilles problems for Filip) whereas Nordås hasn’t been injured for some seven years…

So how identical is the training between these four athletes? -Hard to say; the older brothers’ injury history may have changed their training away from Jakob’s updated (refined) one, and since Nordås and Jakob went astray in early 2022 they probably also changed some of the training in different directions (Nordås upping his mileage even more, Jakob not, but talking about some other significant changes).

In 2022/2023 some of the differences were as follows: Jakob being very found of the tread mill (because of the better pace control) and flat, asphalt courses for his easy runs -running half of it in one direction, then turn and run back again -ultimate control over pace, stretch and time, whereas Nordås shyed away as much as possible from the mill and hard flat surfaces and rigid time control (on the easy runs). And in 2023/2024 Jakob probably was well into some hammering on the track Nordås doesn’t do, although I don’t know the details in Jakob’s new approach…

To me the question is: Can Jakob adjust his training more similar to Nordås’, without losing his momentum (Nordås sort of seems to plateauing)? Or can Jakob only do some minor changes (softer surfaces, less mill, fewer (e.g indoors) competitions) and thus stay healthy enough?

Armstronglivs wrote:

justanothercuriousdude wrote:

I like your post. But here I will focus only on this paragraph: “He's now developing a pattern of achilles injuries, the primary cause of these are lower leg muscular stiffness and tightness. You don't think that might be linked to the huge threshold volume he's doing on the track in his blubber soft Alphafly trainers?”

So here are my comments: There are especially three other athletes I know of who do/have done the same type of threshold training as Jakob (I don’t include Almgren here; I think his training and focus differ too much in periods): Jakob’s two older brothers, Henrik and Filip, and their fellow countryman Narve Nordås. Well, we know that the brothers are even more injury ridden than Jakob (a lot of Achilles problems for Filip) whereas Nordås hasn’t been injured for some seven years…

So how identical is the training between these four athletes? -Hard to say; the older brothers’ injury history may have changed their training away from Jakob’s updated (refined) one, and since Nordås and Jakob went astray in early 2022 they probably also changed some of the training in different directions (Nordås upping his mileage even more, Jakob not, but talking about some other significant changes).

In 2022/2023 some of the differences were as follows: Jakob being very found of the tread mill (because of the better pace control) and flat, asphalt courses for his easy runs -running half of it in one direction, then turn and run back again -ultimate control over pace, stretch and time, whereas Nordås shyed away as much as possible from the mill and hard flat surfaces and rigid time control (on the easy runs). And in 2023/2024 Jakob probably was well into some hammering on the track Nordås doesn’t do, although I don’t know the details in Jakob’s new approach…

To me the question is: Can Jakob adjust his training more similar to Nordås’, without losing his momentum (Nordås sort of seems to plateauing)? Or can Jakob only do some minor changes (softer surfaces, less mill, fewer (e.g indoors) competitions) and thus stay healthy enough?

Far too rational for this thread.

Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

philippe wrote:

Guerrouj ran 3:26.12 a couple of weeks before turning 27, so I don’t think he’s too old.

Yes that's fact - but it only serves to prove that a 27 year old man can basically 3.26 flat for 1500m (which I personally think is the true WR, that's a different matter though).

It's not as simple as just as a number of years lived on earth, because no career paths are the same.

A good example of that is how El Guerrouj was basically a 1500m specialist exclusively up until 2002. He didn't touch the 5000m competitively (ie. a race) from 1992 as a junior until the 2003 season and of course he retired in 2004. He had an elite career spanning a decade, 1995-2004. I counted 139 races on his WA profile across those ten years and only 18 of them were not 1500m/mile races (the majority were indoor 3000m races). Even if my counting was off by 1-2 races somewhere along the line it doesn't change the fact that he only really focused on being great at one distance the vast majority of his career. I'd be very surprised whether those 3000m races meant a massive shift in training for him. He ran five 5000m races in his pro career -2 at the Paris WC, 2 in Athens and the one head to head with Cherono in Ostrava.

This is obviously very different to Jakob who has been a legit dual 1500/5000 guy since 2018 at the Euros. Every championships he's done since then except for Tokyo 21 ('20) he's run both the 1500 and 5000m. You can simply not look at what El G did at 27 and suggest it would apply to Jakob. They have had markedly different career paths and are markedly different runners starting first and foremost with how they train.

Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

mclovin96 wrote:

Top white 5000m athletes tend to peak slightly later in their careers. Tegenkamp 27, Bob Kennedy 26, Solinsky 26, Rupp 26, Almgren 30, Moorcroft 29..

Yes, but again it's not as simple as saying "look what these white guys did, this is what another white guy will automatically do".

It's easy to forget that at age 17 he was the double Euro champ over 1500 and 5000m. He ran 3.31.1 and I think it's fair to say he had low 13 min potential at that time (13.17 with a 2.28 final km and a 54.05 final lap). 17 years old, 3.31 and beating up senior athletes over 5000m in championships races? None of those athletes you named there were even remotely close to that level at that age. Tegenkamp at 20 ran 13.44 and 13.30 at 22. Kennedy 13.22 at age 20 (and that was in Oslo so that was absolutely his max at that age). Rupp didn't break 13.20 until he was 22.

I'm not going to hypothesize what that means for career length, peak age, peak performance window etc etc, but that alone points to significant physical development at a very young age. You can't run 3.31.1 for 1500m (faster than John Walker ever ran, basically as fast as Steve Ovett) when you are 17 and not be very developed.

I think when it comes to teenage prodigies this mistake is always made. We just assume that these early wonder years no matter how good they are, are just "bonus" years that don't count towards their senior careers. The stress/tax on the body running 3.26 as a 23 year old is no different to running 3.31 at 17 and it all accumulates and counts. It's fair to say he wasn't really "on the circuit" as a pro until 2022 when society got back on track, but his career as an elite is far more advanced than just 4 years, (2022,23,24,25) even at age 25.