Who is a better distance runner Eliud Kipchoge or Kenenisa Bekele?

Shorter was a six time US champion in the 3 mi/6 mi/10000, American record holder in the 10, 5th place in the Olympic 10 and 4x US xc champion. He also won a lot of prestigious road races short of the marathon. Maybe these accomplishments are a bit short of Rupp’s, but it’s not like he was a chump other than in the marathon!

Bekele owned Kipchoge on the track for a decade. Peak Bekele was the greatest distance runner ever. Kipchoge has revolutionized the marathon and he is the GOAT at the marathon. But Bekele is still the king.

WE've seen this thread before. At present it's easy to vote for Kipchoge, given his brilliance over the marathon and his mind-over-matter magic.

I note there are those who say Bekele is better, as he wins in head-to-head between the two; the problem with that is Bekele's inconsistency after his 2010 injury. How many races, or seasons, did he miss, how much fitness did he lose to injury? The harsh fact is that you can't race at your best when injuries stop you from training.

In my opinion, it is a tie for the distance running goat. each man has had his ups and downs.

Some Kenny fans are not rational about how great he is, this is understandable, they worshipped at his alter in his peak years. Now, there are a whole generation and more of fans who didn't witness his brilliance at it's peak, so they may favor Kipchoge.

while I tend to favor Kipchoge a little, here's a good example of why I say these men are equal at GOAT. This is Kenny B. at his most brilliant, you have to love this guy:

2008 Olympic 5000m, dusting Eluid by 40m+ over the last lap.

More natural talent : Bekele

More injury :Bekele

More discipline and unconditionally focused in training : Kipchoge

since I believe that Talent is a gift from God but then is up to you to make it grown with hard work and training . I think that what Kipchoge has done in the Marathon in the last 10 years is even bigger than what Bekele did on track and cross country. The amount of training Kipchoge has done in the past 10 years to achieve that is absolutely outstanding . I mean the WR , 2 olympic gold, London , Berlin , sub 2 are only the final results . But if we look back to ten years of marathon training without injury is incredible. Thats why I think Kipchoge achievment is well beyond road running is something really outstanding in the world of sport

I'd love to see Letsrun do an article analyzing this, ask opinions from prominent people in the running world, and post a poll on the front page. Would be an interesting read.

More discipline and unconditionally focused in training: 2:01:09

Past his prime marathon dilettante: 2:01:41, a mere 32 seconds behind

Kenenisa FTW

How about we all just be grateful to be living in a time where we get to see two of the most gifted runners to have ever lived at work.

That’s fair

Bekele

You said "distance runner".

I made a similar post a few years back for Bekele vs. Geb. Here, IMHO, are the criteria (although weighting them is a different story):

* Longevity - They beat your father and they'll beat you

* Range - You are great at one event? That's cute.

* Dominance - They win. Always. Shoot for second and save yourself the humiliation

* Records - Self explanatory

* Olympic/WC medals - Obviously the Olympics are the big deal.

So how do we compare the two?

Longevity - Tough call. Both are old and still great. Kipchoge has been top of the marathon pack for longer than Bekele was top of cross-country/track, but it's close. I really don't know how to rate this. Tie?

Range - Please. Bekele. Shut up. No, YOU SHUT UP. It's Bekele.

Dominance - Kipchoge owns the marathon, but Bekele certainly had periods where he was unbeatable. Perhaps a tie? Nah, I'll give it to Kipchoge.

Records - Bekele has set more records and you can't argue with the quality.

Medals - If we just count Olympics and WC, Bekele takes it in a walk. If you want to include World Marathon Majors then I'm going to count Cross Country and he also takes it. Bekele. Done.

Resolved: Bekele is the greatest distance runner.

“Arguments [I] couldn’t rebut.”

I made my case for Kipchoge several times. What you call an inability to rebut, I call an irreconcilable difference in subjective opinion. I wasn’t going to waste my time endlessly rehashing my points when you couldn’t understand that.

Sorokin is the real distance GOAT (WR: 6h, 100k, 100m, 12h, 24h)

Fair analysis, but in terms of longevity I absolutely give it to Kipchoge. It’s as if he’s now at his peak after winning the 5k at Worlds 19 years ago, and he’s been remarkably healthy and consistent over the back half of his career. Bekele had some fairly world class performances in 2001-2002, but not on the level both runners emerged at in 2003 (and obviously, Kipchoge looks more likely to extend his time at or near the top).

Range I’d say Bekele, but it’s not really a blowout like you sort of imply. 3:32/7:25 for Bekele vs. 3:33/7:27 for Kipchoge with Kipchoge the superior marathoner (and I don’t go in for this coulda/shoulda/woulda for Bekele’s marathon potential).

Dominance I’m with you that it’s Kipchoge. Bekele did what Geb did on the track but a little better (plus doing what Tergat did in XC but better, which is obviously insanely impressive), El Guerrouj did what Morceli did but a little better, but I don’t think there’s any historical precedent for what Kipchoge’s done in the marathon since 2012. The marathon is not supposed to work like that, so to speak, so I hear the argument that the marathon is easier to dominate but I believe it’s dead wrong.

Kipchoge has the better Olympic career, this is obvious to me. Bekele had the near double-double in ‘04/‘08, which is awesome but that’s also to say he came short of what Farah and Viren were able to do (and equals Zatopek minus Zatopek’s marathon win), while Kipchoge’s defended his marathon crown (joining only Bikila and Cierpinski—friggin’ Cierpinski) AND has two lesser 5k medals from different Olympics. Has any other man in history won Olympic distance medals at 4 different Olympics, let alone over a span of 17 years?

I also don’t think we should completely ignore the Breaking 2 and Ineos exhibitions either. I know those times are not record eligible and the event may have been a big turnoff for some purists, but they were nevertheless super impressive and managed to reach a much broader audience than what Bekele achieved, which can be considered a small factor when assessing “greatness.”

Buddy, why don't you just (finally) address the criticisms of your arguments in that thread in the final couple pages? Multiple posters thought those criticisms/questions were justified.

You've huffed and puffed four or five times now when called out for ducking them. Surely in the time you took writing those posts you could have simply actually tried to respond to people's arguments.

Geb was better than both : longevity, range, WR's broken (number and margin)!

I’m not sure how to explain this to you. I have no way of addressing those arguments but to say “I appreciate Bekele’s greatness and have long since been aware of his career achievements, and I know his career features certain strengths and highlights that Kipchoge’s does not; until last year I thought he was the clear choice for the GOAT, but here’s why I believe Kipchoge has surpassed him” and then make my case for Kipchoge vs. Bekele. That works both ways, and is all I can expect from those with another opinion. That’s how these kinds of arguments usually work. I respect the argument that Bekele is the GOAT, but I’m peeved by your assumptions that your argument is definitive, or I have been “proven wrong.”

Blah blah blah. Bad loser. It's still Bekele.

IMO, your sense of what it means to argue is a bit blinkered. Arguments don't involve merely stating one's opinions, hearing those of others, and then stating one's opinions again -- or, as you put it above, "endlessly rehashing [one's] points." They involve justifying those opinions, which may prompt others to question the logic behind those justifications, just as you might question the logic behind their arguments. Ideally, it's a back-and-forth, a dialogue, not people talking at (or past) one another.

In that Bekele-Kipchoge thread, very specific questions were posed about the logic of your argument. These questions weren't themselves a case for Bekele's supremacy; they were challenges to particular aspects of your reasoning. And they weren't bad or silly questions; other posters even jumped in to note that they merited a serious response.

First you ignored these questions. Then, when pressed, you claimed you'd already factored them into your decision about Kipchoge's preeminence (which is basically tantamount to saying, "I hold opinion X but am not willing to explain the reasoning behind that opinion"). Then, pressed further, you more or less claimed that it was beneath you to address these questions. And then you vanished.

When I write that "the OP can't rebut these arugments," I'm not saying the arguments themselves are irrefutable or authoritative. I'm saying that, based on your extreme evasiveness when confronted with those arguments, you in particular don't seem to have a real response to them. Perhaps others do.

And I wouldn't have even bothered engaging you in that debate if I hadn't thought your contributions generally smart and well thought-out, even if I didn't agree with them. (Why even bother debating the trolls, right?) I asked my questions because I was curious to see how you'd respond, not because I thought I had some argumentative trump card that would settle the debate once and for all. That's why I found the evasiveness so odd back then. There was no need to flee the scene.