Mary Moraa Goes from 1st to Last to 1st in Commonwealth 800 - Has this ever happened before in an elite 800?

The number of top 400 runners that moved up to 800 and became world class at 800 is VERY small.

Just because Mu and Moraa did it doesn't mean that most can do it.

Laura Muir wasn't utterly defeated, she was happy to get the bronze. She was just tired, that's all. No need to exaggerate.

Well, it made a good graphic! Moraa is another fresh talent on the scene and this already great event continues to become more interesting. Here's hoping the best for Muir in the 1500m!

I say Mary on a good day vs Athing on a bad day will be very interesting.

I think she ran the race that as a 400m runner moving up to 800m as a novice, she would run in a time trial as well as a race.

Shoots off fast as it feels easy. Get's scared when she starts to feel a bit tired and there's still 400m to go, then realizes she's Ok, and sprints in.

I think her raw talent level is considerably above that field.

Holy mother. Yeah, that was one of the most ridiculous races I've ever seen anyone run.

That looks like a girl who could break 1:54 at some point in the next couple years, if she gets some experience with the distance, and some serious coaching --and eventually learns how to run it with some modest degree of sanity.

I agree: she may give Athing a whole *lot* of trouble.

It's true not many 400m runners move up to 800m. One who could run with these 1:57 runners is Bol. A great 400m hurdler with sub 50 in the open 400m. When Mu and Moraa get in the 1:54 range things will be different. Keely will approach her improvement from the strength and endurance side of things. I hope she can stay with Mu and Moraa as they run closer to their potential next season.

In her world junior championship, Roisin Willis ran something quite similar to Moraa, only without falling back to last. She went out super hard in 27 (Moraa in 26.2), suffered from the early pace and dropped back to 32 (Moraa 31), then started to get back into it in 31? (30), and then closed like a house on fire to take the title in 29 (28). Very similar. They didn't take the initial pace long enough to destroy their chances, rested 400 and were able to close well for the win.

That was Willis's strategy.

But as Moraa admitted in her interview after the race, it wasn't her strategy. She just felt unusually tired between 300 to 400, and then got a second wind in the backstretch. It wasn't a plan at all.

How many of the top ten faatest 400 hurdlers of all time, man or woman, became a world class 800 runner? None.

Harald Schmidt of Germany did. He used to be one of Edwin Moses' top rivals (not that anyone was really close to him!). I believe Schmidt ended up running around 1:44-ish for 800m.

Muir Scottish fail.

From the Guardian:

The stats showed that Moraa had the fastest first 200m (25.9) and fastest final 200m (29.3) splits of the entire 800m field. But in between she also had the slowest middle 400m of 61.9. As the Kenyan explained afterwards, her unusual tactics had not been planned. “My plan was to go through in 57 or 58 secs, but after 300m I realised I was going too fast,” she said.
“I lost hope because everyone went past me. I was last. But when I got to 200m I started to close the gap. And with 120m to go I was counting 1-2-3-4 and I started to think I could win a medal. So I kept pushing.”

Get this girl some proper coaching.

^ Link

theguardian.com

Hodgkinson heartbreak as Moraa beats her to Commonwealth Games gold

https://www.theguardian.com/profile/seaningle

Keely Hodgkinson had to settle for another second place after Kenya’s Mary Moraa stunned her with an unconventional surge for gold

Open link

That's not true. If you want people to stay on topic, which I think is a legitimate request that's totally appropriate in this case, then you shouldn't make false claims like this.

XY DSD athletes are allowed to compete in the women's 800 (and other middle distance events) so long as they have taken medication to suppress the amount of endogenous testosterone their testes produce to below 5 nmol/L for 6 months. XY DSD athletes are not "banned" from the 400 to mile like LRC headquarters and posters keep claiming. They are still allowed to compete in middle-distance events if they suppress their endogenous T for a time.

If an XY DSD athlete is suppressing T, they are free to compete in any/all women's events - and there is no way the public would know about their sex or hormone status. For good reason, WA does not publish personal medical information about XY DSD athletes competing in women's MD events who are complying with the rules now in place.

Agreed. This is turning into a circus. I think that the brojos are treading lightly here based on the rumor of their press credentials getting reviewed due to apparently insensitive questions at the World Championships. My stance is like yo I don't want to accuse every manly looking woman of being XY DSD but if LetsRun folds to this pressure and *isn't willing to ask this question* it's a huge WTF. It's not even a fluid thing like doping and there are megabytes of text on this website concerning doping. Whose responsibility is it to inform me that I should be cheering for second place?

Lol. So I knew coevett [ and his sympathizers] would have an excuse when pure, white, Keely lost again.

It's always going to be:

The black gal beat her because...

1] she is doping

2] she is a man

3] she thuggishly cut poor keely off!

4] [junior races] she is an age cheat

It will NEVER be- she got beat fair and square by a better, albeit darker, female Runner.

Lol at that clown!

Love does make you irrational

Moraa’s first 200s have been erratic. She got it right at Kenyan trials but here and in one of the Eugene rounds she went comically fast. But her finishing never really is in doubt because she slows and then rallies. That seems to be something Cram/Paula missed. Keely finishes really well and hard in negative split races or ones where she’s laid off the pace. This year we’ve seen that if she’s out in 56-57, she is a good finisher but not good enough to blow by Mu even with the inside lane and a run on the rail, or when she was beaten by Moraa in the DL and so on. As soon as I saw Moraa was still in it with 150 to go I had the feeling that Keely was vulnerable. Moraa and Mu have the major 400m speed advantage and I just trust their extra gear over hers.