Official 2019 USATF 25k Champs Discussion Thread. Parker Stinson breaks the American record!

Bad Wigins wrote:

so are there any other certified 25k races besides the "champs?"

Two big ones I know of are in Berlin and India.

I was there,,,, wrote:

NewtotheSouthSide wrote:

I don't know how much folks love the course in Pittsburgh. I think, since people don't always race the half a ton, that it'd be beneficial to put the Champs on a faster course.

After Pittsburgh, almost every elite in the elite tent was speculating (whining?) about how slow the course was. I laughed. People were saying 1:30-2:00 slow. Laughable...

Yeah, runners are always trying to find ways (excuses?) to how their time could have been faster. I do it all the time. You gotta show up and race the course that you get on the day that you get. I just think for a national championship put it somewhere fast so you get better fields and see how many 1:02/1:10 or better times you can produce.

& for people knocking the 25k distance and past champions I would argue that the half marathon really isn't always the best prep for a marathon. It's still half the distance. I think it's a good sign for Parker that he maintained 1:02 pace for another 2+ miles. No guarantee he'll put it all together but that's still super encouraging.

kmaclam wrote:

Runningart2004 wrote:

The race formerly known as the 5th/3rd River Bank Run 25k has been the USATF 25k Champs for decades.

The issue is probably with finding a half-marathon willing to host the USATF Half Marathon Champs.

There also a 20k champs in September.

The USATF 15k, 20k, and 25k champs have all been around for decades in the same place.

Alan

Alan , Not sure you get the gist of what I was trying to highlight. USATF has (besides a host of other distances) a 15K Champs, a 10 Mile Champs, a 20K Champs, a Half Marathon Champs, a 25K Champs, a 30K Champs....And to make it just a bit more bizarre, the Half and 25K were contested just 6 days apart last week.

The fault then is with the Half. The Half isn’t always 6 days before the 25k since it’s not always the same race which hosts the Half Champs. Maybe USATF could have done a better job at finding a different host or maybe other hosts should have come forward?

Or maybe USATF isn’t serving the same population with the Half?

Alan

Ritz coaching him is the best thing that’s happened to Stinson’s career. I think Ritz can be a world class coach if he starts a training group. He obviously has a ton of knowledge running for 20+ years.

Gutsofpre wrote:

Ritz coaching him is the best thing that’s happened to Stinson’s career. I think Ritz can be a world class coach if he starts a training group. He obviously has a ton of knowledge running for 20+ years.

Speaking of Ritz, this just showed up in my reccommend videos. Seems Ritz is working on gears he hasn't used in a while.

It's not so much a matter of serving a population as of finding an acceptable host. The AAU always had national championship races at 15, 20, 25, and 30 km. But those were always just glorified regional races. With no travel money rarely was someone going to travel from California to Gardner, Ma. or Greenbelt, Md to run a national championship race at 20 or 15 km USATF has carried on with the AAU's functions so those championships are still held.

But where and when they were held was always dependent on who was willing to sponsor the races. As someone else pointed out, AAU and later USATF do not stage the races. They declare an existing one as the national championship. If there were more 25ks around and at different times one of them might want to do the paperwork and bid to be the national championship but races at those old championship distances are really rare now so USATF pretty much needs to take what it's offerred.

Live stream watcher wrote:

I'm watching the live stream, Stinson looks like he is running at 5K effort, destined to fall apart in the second half. He will never learn.

Classic Letsrun. Rip on a guy who ends up running an American Record.

Is Google watching me? wrote:

Gutsofpre wrote:

Ritz coaching him is the best thing that’s happened to Stinson’s career. I think Ritz can be a world class coach if he starts a training group. He obviously has a ton of knowledge running for 20+ years.

Speaking of Ritz, this just showed up in my reccommend videos. Seems Ritz is working on gears he hasn't used in a while.

https://youtu.be/t_PqGKXb_Ow

Great career move going over to Ritz. No doubt Ritz can become a world class coach and put together a top notch training group if he wanted to. Without any insider knowledge Ritz seems like a good guy from the way other people talk about him. Sometimes you miss that with top coaches. Feel like he would be someone athletes would want to work with.

Is Google watching me? wrote:

Gutsofpre wrote:

Ritz coaching him is the best thing that’s happened to Stinson’s career. I think Ritz can be a world class coach if he starts a training group. He obviously has a ton of knowledge running for 20+ years.

Speaking of Ritz, this just showed up in my reccommend videos. Seems Ritz is working on gears he hasn't used in a while.

https://youtu.be/t_PqGKXb_Ow

Little Ritz puttin' on the jets @ 3:56

Even Steven strides wrote:

Bad Wigins wrote:

so are there any other certified 25k races besides the "champs?"

Two big ones I know of are in Berlin and India.

But those are real IAAF races. Which US 25k series leads to the big national title event?

Stinson made a post on his Instagram story that he rolled his ankle on the warm up and ran the American record on a sprained ankle. The picture of his ankle is swelled up pretty badly, about the size of a tennis ball.

Lol feat. LR screenshot

https://youtu.be/On-wv850byY