The biggest longshot who will make the 2024 US Olympic Marathon team will be...

For women:

Rojas

Rooker

Simpson

For men:

CJ

Colley

Panning

All somewhat dark horses who I would love to see make the team.

+1 on Colley as a dark horse. Dude is a gamer and has barely been healthy his whole career but finally is now.

Men

1. Rupp

2. Simbassa

3. D. Estrada

Women

1. Saina

2. Sisson

3. Fiona O'Keefe running her Debut Marathon

Collin Buck is my favorite to be number 3 at Trials. 2:17:09 for qualifying time.

Laugh, but he just did a 5x5k workout, posted on strava:
"Splits 14:56 14:44 14:43 14:43 14:05
3:30 rest 50ft elevation per rep"

Puts his last 4 reps at 4:41 mile pace.

Matt McDonald was 10th at last trials and beat Connor Mantz at Boston this year.

You’re taking results at face value. Mantz ran with the leaders for the first half of the race and suffered through a big positive split. If his goal had been to beat McDonald, he would have done so by at least a couple of minutes.

Boston is not an indicator of trials performance

Yeah, he's definitely gonna be in the hunt assuming they give him 3:30 minutes rest every 5k!

Nathan Martin, would love to see him sneak in like Abdi did in ATL. Wait, how or why is he qualified but not entered/declared? Dang. Isai Rodriguez just because it would be fun to see another 1/2 OTQ runner make the team. Any of the Hansons runners. And Molly Seidel, who may not be a genuine longshot, but because she's had a long road since '21 and how much it would trigger her weirdo snowflake LRC hater brigade if she made the team.

nobody running their first marathon will make the team this trials, per Fiona okeefe

Picking Mantz and Clayton as two spots for the men (in no particular order). Same with Sisson and Saina for the women. Don't mean to go chalk, but I think Mantz and Sisson probably belong in a tier of their own, and don't discount Clayton's performance in Chicago 2023. Remember what Jake Riley did after a strong showing in Chicago?

As for sleepers, I do think more than one will make the team. A few athletes that intrigue me include Nico Montanez, Afewerki Zeru, and maybe Futsum Z (although I'm not sure the NAZ Elite staff knows much about training marathoners). Stop running 400s guys.

For the women, I think Sara Vaughn has a shot (again, like Clayton, using fall 2023 fitness as an indicator). My bigger dark horse however is Nell Rojas. She's done well in championship style marathons.

Andrew MF'n Colley

He's had a healthy training block for the first time ever as a pro. Dude ran 2:11 at Grandma's in a pair of old school On flats off like 60 miles a week. Houston 2 weeks ago was just the start. He'd have been top 10 in 2020 if he hadn't ripped his post tip off trying to run in vaporflys for the first time. If he was top 10 in 2020 and just ripped that Houston time more people would consider him a real threat. Don't be shocked when he nabs that 3rd spot from Abdi.

Patrick Smyth

Jack Mastandrea will steal the show.

I will love love love to see Jenny Simpson get the spot but it's not happening.

It’s a better workout than what Young and Mantz just did… don’t be a dunce.

Frank Lara

Would love to see this but I’m not sure Ben True is entered. Does anyone know if he’s retired now? Seems to still be running and has his Northwoods crew now but not sure if he’s a Pro anymore.

Gault should do an “exit interview” with him if that’s the case, he had quite the career

Jared Ward's sixth place finish at the Olympics in 2016 was a long time ago, but I believe he will pace his way - he is a stats professor that wrote the book on marathon pacing - to a third place finish at the trials.

I think Jenny Simpson will also surprise many, but given her speed it should not be a surprise, by placing in the top three.