Not An Expert wrote:
The US (well, Nike, actually) does a pretty good job of giving opportunity to the highest-level guys coming out of college, and this guys is at that level. (New Balance seems like it it's a reasonable alternative for some of the highest-level women, too.) He most likely ends up with one of the Nike groups, training as a 5k/10k guy.
I think a more interesting question is what to do you do if you're a 3:41/13:35-:40 guy. The US needs to do a better job of making it financially viable for guys at this level out of college to stay in the sport; we don't know how many potential "diamonds in the rough" we're losing because they're not fast enough at 22-23 to get a good contract because they were poorly trained in college, or dealt with a string of injuries, or who didn't do any of the little things because they were too focused on academics (or, shit, partying).
Good Points. Another aspect to the question is how do you train and what events do you focus on?
Most replies say train for 5k/10k and get on the roads.