He’s in 1:51/3:45 shape. It’s a tough situation and I don’t agree with him racing this week. Hindsight is 20-20 but when Willis is predicting a 3:45 and pretending it’s part of the plan it’s not a good spot. Race him when he’s ready.
It amazes me on here how all of these arm chair experts think they have an f'ing clue of Kessler's abilities or the plan. Nick tries to give you a view, but the idiots still continue on and on. If you look at the Very Nice Videos, they train and train hard right thru this meet, and he missed training with a small foot injury. It's pretty clear that I am a Ron and VNTC fan of all those guys for a while now, and he knows exactly what he is doing, running 3:30's high in a nothing meet in April is NOT the plan..LOL. I also think people forget that even though marginally he had PR'ed in the Mile Indoors at 3:57.10 at still 18 years old, turning 19 in March. And an eased up looking around 7:59 3K on 1/24. Things were and are going fine.
Some of you also need to know how to analyze race from the splits available, without seeing it. He closed in 1:56.1x and just under 57 and got pipped probably easing up by .08.
He is gonna be fine.
Since when is closing in 1:56 and 57 impressive? His PR is 1:54 and 57 pace for the entire 1500. LMAO stop pretending like you know what you are talking about.
The positive view is even if he doesn’t make a team, there are races to pursue in July/August and even all the way to 5th Ave Mile. So it doesn’t have to be a wasted season even if he’s behind schedule to contend at USAs.
WTF is everyone crying about. Europeans and Africans haven't even started their track seasons yet. No one cares about racing in April. The USA calendar is way out of wack with everyone else in the world due to the collegiate system. He's a 19 year old kid who has had a bit of an injury and is probably racing to see where he's at. He is still an under 20. If this year doesn't go amazing and he runs 3:36-3:38 it doesn't matter that would still be great for someone his age. Stop putting so much pressure on these young kids. Rojo going on about being concerned about Mu and slating the Newbury park kid for having a bad race when he was ill is ridiculous. They are little more than children. Give them a break and let them grow and learn the sport.
WTF is everyone crying about. Europeans and Africans haven't even started their track seasons yet. No one cares about racing in April. The USA calendar is way out of wack with everyone else in the world due to the collegiate system. He's a 19 year old kid who has had a bit of an injury and is probably racing to see where he's at. He is still an under 20. If this year doesn't go amazing and he runs 3:36-3:38 it doesn't matter that would still be great for someone his age. Stop putting so much pressure on these young kids. Rojo going on about being concerned about Mu and slating the Newbury park kid for having a bad race when he was ill is ridiculous. They are little more than children. Give them a break and let them grow and learn the sport.
Nobody is rooting against him. We are just being honest about the FACT that he's out of shape.
He's not a kid anymore. He's a pro athlete that makes more money than you do. None of us could put more pressure on him than his pro contract does.
Apparently something went seriously wrong with his 800 too. That's 100% newsworthy. We are not just going to sit here and pretend everything is ok. It's Rojo's job to be a journalist and report on these things.
WTF is everyone crying about. Europeans and Africans haven't even started their track seasons yet. No one cares about racing in April. The USA calendar is way out of wack with everyone else in the world due to the collegiate system. He's a 19 year old kid who has had a bit of an injury and is probably racing to see where he's at. He is still an under 20. If this year doesn't go amazing and he runs 3:36-3:38 it doesn't matter that would still be great for someone his age. Stop putting so much pressure on these young kids. Rojo going on about being concerned about Mu and slating the Newbury park kid for having a bad race when he was ill is ridiculous. They are little more than children. Give them a break and let them grow and learn the sport.
Nobody is rooting against him. We are just being honest about the FACT that he's out of shape.
He's not a kid anymore. He's a pro athlete that makes more money than you do. None of us could put more pressure on him than his pro contract does.
Apparently something went seriously wrong with his 800 too. That's 100% newsworthy. We are not just going to sit here and pretend everything is ok. It's Rojo's job to be a journalist and report on these things.
Agreed, not sure why some people are getting so defensive of him. This was objectively not a good race 2 months out from USAs. That doesnt mean he is a bust or that his career will be a failure. But people burying their heads in the sand and acting like this is part of Warhurst's grand plan are being naive.
First year as a pro is always a tough transition, he will be fine in the long run.
Assuming his birth year is 2003 (as it says on the WA site), he should be focusing on World Juniors this year, since he doesn't have the NCAA. There will be plenty of overage Kenyans and Epiopians to challenge him. He has lots of time to step up to the Senior level. He is an investment for the future - you people want him to star now. He isn't (nor does he have the background) Jakob I. He didn't need to go to the NCAA to develop either, his name will get him into lots of good meets, maybe even DL ones in the next year or two.
In fact I would focus this year on getting his 800m down to a reasonable level (say 1.45) and only focus his 1500m on later major meets.
This was a rust-buster for him, and he will need a bunch of them - he is not a 23 year old College post-grad. You people panic too much, sure as heck hope none of you coach, because I would hate to be your athlete - written off after one race that doesn't meet YOUR expectation.
Personally would love if he ran World Juniors. August 1-6 meet and softer competition to get in, so it’s more realistic than Worlds. I don’t agree with the “nothing to see here, everything is part of the plan” view, but there’s plenty of room to be thriving in August.
He would be borderline qualifying for DII nationals as of right now, right on the bubble. No pro should struggling to run a time to qualify for DII nationals.
Assuming his birth year is 2003 (as it says on the WA site), he should be focusing on World Juniors this year, since he doesn't have the NCAA. There will be plenty of overage Kenyans and Epiopians to challenge him. He has lots of time to step up to the Senior level. He is an investment for the future - you people want him to star now. He isn't (nor does he have the background) Jakob I. He didn't need to go to the NCAA to develop either, his name will get him into lots of good meets, maybe even DL ones in the next year or two.
In fact I would focus this year on getting his 800m down to a reasonable level (say 1.45) and only focus his 1500m on later major meets.
This was a rust-buster for him, and he will need a bunch of them - he is not a 23 year old College post-grad. You people panic too much, sure as heck hope none of you coach, because I would hate to be your athlete - written off after one race that doesn't meet YOUR expectation.
I actually agree with you. Everyone else made excuses for his performance because "he hasn't done much speed yet". I said he should have been focusing on speed for months or even years.
But this isn't high school where you race yourself into shape. He'd be better off doing a workout than going out and running 11 seconds slower than his PB. His 1st race indoors in 2021 was his 3:57 high school record. He didn't need a rust buster for that.
His coach shouldn't panic but his coach should also sit down with him and re-evaluate their goals and expectations for the year. From reports in this thread, he DNF'd the 800 and got extremely angry after - even throwing his shoe.
Right now he is running like he should’ve gone in to the ncaa. More time to develop before having to race pro. Not sure why everyone was so excited for him to go pro out of high school.
Quite the opposite. Right now, he is running times showing why if you care at all about money, he almost had to take the money and go pro. Dude will have multiple millions in his bank account. If he'd gone to college and rocked it, it's unlikely he would have gotten more than what he got last year.
And I say that as someone who thinks in principal kids should race in college.
Right now he is running like he should’ve gone in to the ncaa. More time to develop before having to race pro. Not sure why everyone was so excited for him to go pro out of high school.
Quite the opposite. Right now, he is running times showing why if you care at all about money, he almost had to take the money and go pro. Dude will have multiple millions in his bank account. If he'd gone to college and rocked it, it's unlikely he would have gotten more than what he got last year.
And I say that as someone who thinks in principal kids should race in college.
Is there any evidence his contract is worth millions? Is he getting more than Drew Hunter?
Quite the opposite. Right now, he is running times showing why if you care at all about money, he almost had to take the money and go pro. Dude will have multiple millions in his bank account. If he'd gone to college and rocked it, it's unlikely he would have gotten more than what he got last year.
And I say that as someone who thinks in principal kids should race in college.
It depends. If he rocked it as you say and won a pretty wide-open mile at NCAAs and backed it up outdoors, he’d get paid the exact same. But if he finished top 3 in both (losing to the likes of Garcia-Romo, Kipsang, Nuguse or Beadlescomb), he’d probably get a little less but a contract would be there. The argument I suppose would be over what would be most likely. He was obviously really good with this setup last year, but it hasn’t clicked so far this year.
Right now he is running like he should’ve gone in to the ncaa. More time to develop before having to race pro. Not sure why everyone was so excited for him to go pro out of high school.
Quite the opposite. Right now, he is running times showing why if you care at all about money, he almost had to take the money and go pro. Dude will have multiple millions in his bank account. If he'd gone to college and rocked it, it's unlikely he would have gotten more than what he got last year.
And I say that as someone who thinks in principal kids should race in college.
That is old thinking. Adidas could have organized the same contract as a NIL deal. It doesn’t have to be one or the other anymore.