MichXCMan wrote:
I'd say at this point she's earned a spot roughly in the top 4-8 USA high school girls all time, depending how you measure it. First, you have to define GOAT and whether you're talking more about titles, honors or just fastest times. And with the latter, distance covers 800 to 5k, so measuring an overall distance GOAT is tough. Also, do you include performances as "pros" while the athletes is still in HS?
Tuohy is clearly the fastest ever at the track 5000, in or out, and she may be on her way to becoming the best XC runner of all time. Her performance Saturday was #3 a-t speed rating-wise (FWIW), behind Foot Locker winning performances by Trotter and Fairchild. By the end of this season, she may surpass them and with 1 or 2 more nattys (NXN or FL), she would really cement the best-ever title over 5000 (track/XC combined).
As the 1500/1600/mile and the 3k/3200/2M, she may have the outdoor mile mark and 3200 mark, but on the combined/converted lists, she still ranks behind Cain, Efraimson and Rainsberger (9:00.x 3k outdoors) in the latter and those plus a few more in the former. Cain, Efraimson, Murphy, Aragon and a couple others have run 1500s faster equiv. than Tuohy's 4:33 mile. And as far as 800, Tuohy's not in the conversation yet.
So can Tuohy catch those ahead of her on the above-mentioned lists? If she stays healthy, I can definitely see her breaking Cain's 9:38 2M mark (or equiv. at 3200/3k) this year or the next. The 1500/mile will be tougher, but she might get that, too. She doesn't have Cain's leg speed, but if she got down to 2:04, say, maybe she can run 4:24.