Ryan Hall to Skip USXC Nationals to Focus on London

SouthernSun wrote:

In the early '70s Frank Shorter used to win U.S. Nationals in XC at the end of November and a week or two later win the Fukuoka Marathon in Japan (which was, at the time, the most important marathon in the world outside of the Olympics). And in '72 when he won gold in Munich he set an American record in the 10K on the track a week before while finishing 5th - and after running a 10K qualifying heat. So, yes, I'm disappointed Hall hasn't followed Shorter's strategy.

who cares what strategy he uses as long as it is right for him. tergat, geb, ramaala, baldini, lel, etc aren't running world cross or their respective national cross champs either? you disappointed in them too? moron.

are we talking about dominance in the US or worldwide? if we want to limit it to US, sure, an athlete could pretty easily dominate here across a few distances. hall certainly looks like he could. but if you want to achieve the big stuff, these days you pretty much have to focus on one event. that's what hall is doing.

as for cabada's debut, one of the best time-wise and, arguably, the best "effort"-wise.

Hall hasn't dominated any event in the US, yet. Baby steps.

If I were you, I would have just thrown the fact that Cabada's skipping xc nationals in my face. I actually agree that Hall is smart to skip xc nationals and London isn't the only good reason, it's just the best one. The uber-specialization of this era has unfortunately reduced the quality of team that the US sends to XC Worlds. Compared with even track and the marathon, xc pays next to nothing so there is little incentive to be an xc specialist and dabble in the roads or even to favor xc much beyond what competing at nationals could mean in terms of a sponsorship contract requirement/bonus rather than instead focus on spring national championships on the roads. Supposing the heavies come through on Feb. 10th, the men's team could very well look like this:

Ritz

Abdi

Goucher

J. Torres

Dobson

Robison

Culpepper

Bizuneh

Browne

That would be a tough squad to be able to send to Kenya in March. However, Culpepper probably won't go due to a spring marathon commitment and I wouldn't be surprised to see Abdi and Browne do the same, or they along with Bizuneh might figure to take the more lucrative route and focus on the spring national champs on the roads, and Ritz is usually a question mark at championships.

"hope no one else defects; unfortunately, I can see it coming. There is definitely a resurgence is US distance running and no matter what place Hall gets in London, unless he wins or is a close contender he will have passed up the opportunity to upgrade America‘s prestige and inspire our youth. Finishing 7 or 8th in London would be a great personal achievement, but it will not capture any media attention or register with our youth. The one thing I admire about the Ethiopians is they place national goals over personal goals. --I wish him well in London"

- In response to this

Ryan has already registerd with our youth. Every little high school kid in the nation reads message boards and plenty of them know that Ryan Hall is a great runner. He also has plenty of time to run for the US in world competitions also. If he needs to skip USA XC to focus on the biggest marathon in the world, and try to seriously compete with those guys- he should. I dont know what is a better example for our youth then that. Dont be afraid to battle the best guys, just go out and do it.

If Ryan has a great race in London he will probably seal himself as the best US marathoner for sure, he will go to the olympics in the marathon and get himself medal potentially. I say, skip the XC champs, focus for a little while longer and go get yourself a great marathon debut against the best in the world. That will pay of more for the olympics then this XC meet. National racing is very important, but an international meet like this will benefit him more, which in turn will help him later on down the road.

jwrun wrote:

Every little high school kid in the nation reads message boards and plenty of them know that Ryan Hall is a great runner.

No, neither does "every little high school kid in the nation" have cable to be able to catch Webb running the mile on ESPN2. Far from it. Get outside your bubble of affluence sometime and then you'll have an informed perspective.

you're right. i'd forgotten how much of a poor, workingman's child sport distance running was.

"No, neither does "every little high school kid in the nation" have cable to be able to catch Webb running the mile on ESPN2. Far from it. Get outside your bubble of affluence sometime and then you'll have an informed perspective."

-Quit being such a sourpuss. 90% of kids out there have cable TV, so yeah, if they wanted to watch T&F on tv they could. I realize that there are large amounts of people who probably cant afford cable TV, and there are lots of people who just choose not to have cable TV. But the majority of people do. And I know the numbers are less for internet, although there are lots of schools that might have less than perfect computers and internet access for our children, most do, and those kids that might not have internet at home might be getting their running news from computer labs at school when they are in class.

Besides, Ryan skipping USAs for a year isnt going to bust any little kids chance to love our sport. In fact, like i said before, him going to London to get some better international experience is whats going to ultimatly get the kids involved in running, becuase after London, when hes in China running the marathon for the US, we know he wont just be there for the experience, but a medal.

Wrong.