Why I don’t really care about the Mens 1500m Results despite the top 3 doing really well

I appreciate Jakob for making it a great race, but the goal is to win not to have a better equivalent performance giving circumstances of leading vs following.

So Prefontaine really won at Munich and set a wr.

Crashed and burned.

I really don’t care about your opinion because it’s incredibly stupid. The winner ran the most impressive race because he won, know you are dad Jakob lost but that doesn’t mean you should say this

Jingy had a strong performance in the 1200 meters, but unfortunately, the race was 1500 meters, where the primary goal is to finish first.

Oh what a Christmas we'd have

I agree that ppl are underrating Jakob's pyrrhic victory. Sure, the official results will never tell the full story of what happened here.

But I actually do care about the results. Maybe a few years ago Jakob was considered the hands down favorite in practically every 1500m. But these results show that this event is in its prime with way more talent than anyone could've ever dreamed of. Even Hobbs Kessler's performance was overshadowed.

I remember pre covid when Craig Engels was all the craze in the 1500m, and now he's just an after thought (as fellow poster commented on the other thread that he was hoping for 3:35 Championship races). The results show that the bar has been significantly raised. And that's great for the event and great for the sport!

Jakob didn't win, so he certainly failed the main goal of a race (to win).

BUT, it is hard to say it wasn't the most physically impressive feat in retrospect. Cole and Naguse kicking hard is a close 2nd/3rd. Jakob made what was probably a split second decision to lead from the start instead of waiting a bit and that cost him.

Maybe he thought waiting to ratchet the pace later wouldn't be enough or maybe it was just a bad call egged on by ego/nerves. Regardless, it was a gutsy way to try and win and you have to applaud that. It reminded me of Pre's push near the end of the 72' 5000. I do think it's silly to say that people will only remember who won etc. True running fans know the ins and outs of championship running. Jakob's race risk will be remembered and admired in its own way. And honestly, getting 4th was a better outcome for him than 2nd or 3rd.

Look, I love the troll job. You nailed it.

The point of a foot race is to win. Preferably as slowly as possible. Since that’s the goal, and everyone knows it’s, anyone who doesn’t win a given race at the elite/international level could not have done a better job than the winner. Success in a championship race is only measured by one metric.

Great race. However the last time the U.S. had multiple medals in the 1500 was 1912.

We suck historically and distance geeks lost their minds. The U.S. has swept medals in numerous events many times and folks never acted like this.

Hopefully we can get as half as good in distance as we are in sprints and throws.

Jakob raced like an idiot. You don’t get bonus points for mis-judging your effort which he admitted to. He was greedy and pushed too hard in the beginning and in the middle to try and break the field without being mindful of his own energy reserves. He may have actually gotten a medal if he saved something that last 100m. His race was not more impressive than the top 3.

Lol Jakob didn't medal, it was not more impressive than anyone ahead of him. Nobody cares what Jakob did. It was a boneheaded tactic.

That was the only play Jakob had to give himself a chance of winning. If he had won with that tactic, we’d have called it “gutsy”.

get rich or die trying

There is another good reason for not caring about the final. A bunch of 3:27's in a championship final after a series of rounds and sudden unexpected elevations in form suggest the usual thing is at play. Nothing can be trusted. You have to pretend not to see it in order to accept it.

I'm happy Kerr didn't win. That's enough. Jakob leads the Olympic gold medal tally 1-0 and Kerr will be 30 years old before he gets his final chance.

Jakob didn't seem devastated in his post race interviews. I suspect a big part of that is the identity of the winner.

Jakob's time was the 25th fastest 1500 ever, that is obviously extremely good and the top 25 fastest 1500 times are held by 9 men, 4 of them are Jakob's times.

The top 3 in the olympic final ran times that are equal 17th, 20th and 21st fastest of all time, so ranking those runs against Jakob's, they are closer to being the best in history than his.

So the top 4 in that race now are all in the top 10 fastest 1500 guys in history.

Jakob is the best of those guys in time trials (but the 3 guys above him will hopefully get themselves into some fast races in the next month) but not as good as championship 1500s it seems.

Leading the race for the first 99% of the race doesn't matter, it's who crosses the line first that is the best on the day, it's a race, if it was a time trial they could just run 3.75 laps by themselves and record the fastest time like in cycling.

There's some merit in what you say, but disagree that Jakob's performance was the most impressive. It will be interesting to see what JIng does in the coming weeks. Wouldn't be surprised if he breaks the 1500m WR in a paced race with lights . . . then moves on to the 5k.

Kerr ran the best race.

He kept his tactics composed to beat Jakob even with the drift into lane 2.

Hocker was not even trying to compete and got lucky he was overlooked for an easy line. Had he battled for a position like Kerr to ensure he could win, he would have a much more difficult job.

Well, if we're gona compare the race times themselves towards the all time great times, surely the context of how those times were achieve matters. Jakob front ran a 28.27. As far as I know, no one's ever run as fast as that from the front. Every other time in that range and faster has come from tucking, i.e. pacing. In championships Jakob becomes the de facto pacer.

The other guys got a better pacing for their effort than anyone could possibly dream of for that time. 1430m out of 1500m paced to 3.27. When Jakob ran his 27s (and sub) he had to do a lot more work all by himself for most of the last lap. He had wavelights, which allows the pacers to be more precise, but often the pacers have been to eager and paced too fast, so while pacers sometime failed, Jakob was hugging the light.

In this race Jakob ran attempting to destroy the field and break away early. It's a risky tactic that didn't work because of the shape the other guys now are in. Had he pulled it off, people would have said it was brilliant. These guys were pulled to their PBs by Jakob. Most (if not all) of the guys who have been PB-ing sub 3:30 the last couple of years have been pulled there by Jakob's speedshow. Kerr ran a tactically sound race with the ideal position, but still lost to Hocker who also took risk and got lucky.